On the 16th of April, the Election Commission of India (ECI) said, it wants to cancel the polls in Vellore. According to the ECI, the contestants in Vellore were allegedly using money to influence voters in their favour.
During the last two weeks, a lot of cash was seized from several Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) leaders. In fact, the district police from the area filed a complaint against DMK leader Kathir Anand and two other Party functionaries.
On the 1st of April, based on information that cashed was moved from the premises of a college owned by the Duraimurugan family to a cement warehouse in Vellore, the Income Tax (IT) Department conducted a second search. According to the findings of the second search, Rs. 11.53 crores was seized from the warehouse.
Other searches conducted at Kathir Anand’s house revealed the presence of Rs. 19 lakhs. However, post the scrutiny, officials were only able to recover Rs. 10.50 lakhs of excess cash.
The EC sent a letter to President Ram Nath Kovind, asking him to cancel the elections in Vellore district, Tamil Nadu. The recommendation will now be shared with the Law Ministry, which will deliver its views on the matter on the 16th of April.
The EC came to the conclusion of the money being used as a tool to influence voters based on a special expenditure report received from the Chief Electoral Officer of Tamil Nadu.
Vellore is scheduled to conduct its elections on the 18th of April. However, it is still unclear if the polling will still be held on the scheduled date.
Stay tuned for more updates.
