Saranda Votes Again

Published here

Digha, April 17

Laxmi Lomga* stood in front of the EVM on Thursday morning and stared as if it was an animal snarling at her. She started towards it twice, withdrew and scratched her head. Only when a poll official approached her and explained the symbols did he smile and press the button of her choice.

Outside the polling booth at Digha village in West Singhbhum's Manoharpur block, Laxmi explained her predicament, husband by her side. "I last voted when they had paper ballots. All you had to do was to fold that piece of paper, drop it into the box and go home. That must have been 15 years back," she said.

Laxmi lives in Tirilposi, the village around which the CPI-Maoist came to establish its Eastern Regional Bureau's headquarters. From around late 2000 to September 2011, the village and the 850 sq km forest that housed it were out of bounds for the State.

Thursday was the first time Tirilposi voted since Anaconda-I, the operation by security forces to reclaim the area. The operation was followed by the Rs. 250 crore Saranda Development Plan. In all, 12,431 voters across 19 polling booths were eligible to vote in Saranda and adjoining areas.

There were fears that Tirilposi's 242 voters may not turn up - their booth had been moved out of the village to Digha, 12 km away, citing security concerns, after all. However, it helped that Thursday is when the region's weekly market convenes across the border in Orissa's Bhalulata and it served as an incentive. By 9 AM, the first voters turned up. Soon, there was a queue.

However, most people from Tirilposi insisted that they cannot be inked. "We had a meeting in the village last morning and decided to vote only if they won't put ink on our fingers," said a village elder. The villagers signed in by using a thumb impression made from a stamp pad. "The ink from the stamp pad can be washed off immediately. However, if the Maoists come to the village in a day or two to check if anyone voted, we would be in trouble," he said.

The people of Tirilposi were not the only ones trying to out-think the Maoists. CRPF personnel at Digha wore white ribbons as shoulders loops. "We were worried that the Maoists would wear uniforms similar to us to trick us," said an officer. The Maoists were not able to hold even meetings calling for poll boycott inside Saranda, according to villagers.

Thanks to the administration shifting polling booths to a central area for security forces to create a secure perimeter, voters had to travel up to 60 km from their homes. The people of Nayagaon were the worst-hit. "We have to walk 17 km to catch a bus to Rourkela. From there, there's another bus to Bhalulata. The polling station is another seven kilometer walk from Bhalulata," said Naresh Khalkho, a polling agent at Digha who started from his village on Wednesday. Khalkho is also a ward member. He won unopposed in 2010 after the Nayagaon booth was located at Manoharpur, a further 25 km from Bhalulata. At Digha, only the Congress had booth agents.

Pradhan Gudiya (19) was angry. "I've made the effort of coming all the way here. Now, the government should give me a job," he said. Physically challenged on all limbs, he took the Saranda passenger from Manoharpur at 7 AM, got off at Bhalulata and cycled to the polling station, reaching by 11 AM.

Mandru Honaga, afflicted with polio, said that the supporter of a political party took him on his cycle to the polling booth at Chotanagara. "It took us two hours to get here. He left after I voted. There's only one Tata Magic arranged by some political leaders ferrying people. There are too many of us; we could be stuck here overnight," he said, as he waited along with Lodro Vahanda, the 74-year-old Munda of Marang Ponga.

When the results came in at the three polling stations in Digha, Saranda seemed to have passed its first test: Digha (71.7) and Tirilposi (66.9) did well, while the Bitkilsoi booth, which included Nayagaon, registered 28.8 per cent of votes. In all, the Singhbhum constituency registered 62 per cent, up from 60.77 in 2009.

All is not well, though - the 55-odd Jharkhandi villages where an estimated 5000 people reside are still disenfranchised. It is difficult to ascertain whether this year is an improvement - in 2009 too, polling percentages were high in polling booths across the region: Serengda (70), Chotanagara West (65) and Kumdi (54), though figures for Digha and Tirilposi were not available. "The officers in the booths punched in the votes on their own in 2009," alleged the Congress' district secretary Sushil Barla, an information that could not be independently verified.

*Names have been changed to respect the privacy of people from Tirilposi.