Perinthalmanna: A day after the a ballot box that went missing from the locker of the sub-treasury in Malappuram district was found 22 km away in the office of the Joint Registrar (General) of Co-operative Societies of Malappuram, the district collector issues show cause notices to six employees.
District Collector V R Premkumar on Tuesday issued show-cause notices to six employees of Malappuram Cooperative Joint Registrar Office and Perinthalmanna Sub-treasury.
The box was misplaced amidst a poll litigation over the result of the Perinthalmanna legislative assembly. The box contained special postal ballots. It is still not known if it was misplaced or taken away by vested interests.
Shocking discovery
The special postal ballots were kept in two iron boxes at the sub-treasury at Perinthalmanna town. The shocking discovery was made when the officers arrived to hold an inspection prior to the submission of the ballots in the Kerala High Court in the election petition over the result of the last Assembly poll in 2021.
A directive that the special ballots and records that are under dispute should be produced in the High Court before Tuesday 5 pm had been received earlier. Subsequently, an inspection of the Perinthalmanna sub-treasury’s locker was made at 7.15 am on Monday in the presence of the representatives of the political parties and one box was found missing. A search was immediately launched. During the search, another box containing the records of the Perinthalmanna block panchayat election was found.
Perinthalmanna Sub-Collector Sreedhanya Suresh said that the ballot box found at the office of Joint Registrar (General) was still in the sealed condition and that it would be produced in the High Court today at 10 am.
Why special postal ballots
An arrangement had been made for COVID-19 patients and the elderly during the last assembly elections to cast their votes at home. The special postal votes are those ballots collected by polling officers by visiting the houses.
The election petition
Najeeb Kanthapuram of the Kerala High Court won from the Perinthalmanna seat in the 2021 Assembly election with the State’s lowest victory margin of 38 votes. The second-placed Left Democratic Front (LDF) candidate, K P Muhammed Musthafa, approached the High Court to challenge the result. The petition prayed for counting the 348 special ballots which were declared invalid as they did not have the signature of the polling officer and the serial number.
(An election petition refers to the judicial procedure for challenging the result of a parliamentary or assembly election.)
In the following search, it was learnt that there was a box in the office of the Malappuram cooperative society general joint registrar, who was the block returning officer during that election.
Incident to be probed: Collector
Malappuram Collector V R Premkumar said that an investigation would be conducted on the issue. Workers of the Youth League picketed the office of the cooperative society office as the search was going on. The police arrested and removed them.
The United Democratic Front (UDF) has come out with the allegation of sabotage. K P Muhammed Musthafa has also demanded an investigation.
