CHENNAI: Two days after the Income Tax department raided Tamil Nadu Health Minister Vijayabaskar the Election Commission has decided to cancel the RK Nagar constituency by-election scheduled on April 12. Attributing the decision to rampant voter bribing and corruption, the commission released a 29-page statement signed by chief election commissioner Nazim Zaidi and his two associates and election commissioners AK Joti and OP Rawat.
By-election to the constituency which lay empty following the death of former Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalithaa "shall be held by the commission in due course when the vitiating effect created by the distribution of money and gift items to lure the electors gets removed with the passage of time, and the atmosphere in the constituency becomes conducive to the holding of free and fair election." Tamil Nadu Chief Electoral Officer Rajesh Lakhoni had also been summoned to submit a report and so was the new-appointed special electoral officer Vikram Batea.
The EC's sudden decision came two days after I-T sleuths launched extensive searches and raids on the residence and several premises of Vijayabaskar across Tamil Nadu. I-T officials said the raids helped uncover a major plot to bribe voters. The documents unearthed showed that close to £9 million was to distributed to voters in R K Nagar constituency by the AIADMK Amma party which fielded T T V Dhinakaran.
"Before parting with the case, the commission cannot help expressing its anguish over the sordid state of affairs as revealed in the reports of the election expenditure observers, election expenditure monitoring teams, static surveillance teams, flying squad teams, video surveillance teams, as well as the reports of the income tax authorities," the statement read.
