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New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI): Delhi poll officials said Thursday that 728 voters at a jhuggi-jhopri cluster in Bela Estate were excluded from the draft electoral roll as their homes were demolished.

The clarification came after media reports highlighted the deletion of 728 of 729 voters registered at Part No. 38, JJ Bela Estate-Vijay Ghat, in the Chandni Chowk Assembly constituency, from the draft roll published on August 31.

The cluster, located on the western bank of the Yamuna and falling in the ecologically sensitive Zone O, had 729 registered voters before the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls began. Only one name remained in the draft roll, resulting in a deletion rate of nearly 99.8 per cent at the booth.

According to an official statement by the office of electoral registration officer (ERO), the electoral roll for the earlier polling station No. 33 was examined after the reports. It found that the addresses of most electors were recorded merely as "Agriculture", while house numbers had been recorded for only a few voters, the statement said.

The officials said a substantial number of people in the area had been engaged in agricultural activities in and around the Yamuna Bank area.

Those agricultural activities, which the ERO office described as "illegal cultivation", were discontinued in 2021, while the dwelling units in the area were demolished in 2022-23, the statement said.

"As a result, the physical and residential status of the area has undergone substantial changes since the preparation of the earlier electoral records," it said.

The ERO office said that during the SIR, booth level officers (BLOs) were required to undertake house-to-house visits to distribute enumeration forms to electors at their registered addresses and later collect the forms.

In the case of Bela Estate, however, the demolition of the dwelling units meant the electors were no longer residing at the addresses recorded in the electoral roll, it said.

Their status as "Ordinary Resident" had therefore changed and the BLO had correctly placed the electors in the 'absent, shifted, dead or duplicate' (ASDD) list, according to the ERO office.

Exclusion from the electoral roll does not prevent an eligible person from seeking inclusion again. A person whose name does not figure in the electoral roll but fulfils the eligibility conditions can apply for inclusion through Form 6 along with the documents prescribed by the Election Commission of India.

The claims and objections period ends on September 30, while the final electoral roll will be published on November 4. PTI MSJ VIT KVK KVK

(This story is published as part of the auto-generated syndicate wire feed. No editing has been done in the headline or the body by ABP Live.)