From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore
Bangalore, Mar 10: After the demand from the Archbishop of Bangalore on behalf of the Catholics and Christian community to the Election Commission to change the Lok Sabha polling date either before the start of the Holy Week from April 13 or after its end on April 19, the State unit of BJP has also petitioned the Election Commission of India to postpone the polling date of April 17 to April 22 or 23 owing to a series of holidays.
In a petition submitted to the Election Commission through the State Chief Electoral Officer Anil Kumar Jhan, the State BJP leaders said that polling might be affected due to several holidays in the week.
Polling is scheduled to be held in Karnataka for the 28 Lok Sabha seats on April 17, followed by three days of holidays - Good Friday (April 18) and Saturday and Sunday.
With April 13 being a holiday as it is a Sunday and April 14 is celebrated as Ambedkar Jayanthi, which is a public holiday, the BJP leaders sought to impress upon the Election Commission authorities that employees, especially those working for the State Government or other State undertakings as also educational institutions would be tempted to avail two days of leave so as to go on a holiday for 8 days with their families.
The State BJP leaders, who comprising former State Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister S Suresh Kumar, Ashwathanarayan, MLC and State BJP media in-charge S Prakash, in their petition to the Election Commission expressed fears that there was every possibility of a large number of voters going on holiday with their families and it would definitely affect the polling.
The Election Commission’s major objective of ensuring high voter turnout in polling itself would be defeated, if the polling date in the State was not changed, the BJP leaders said.
The State is also having a large number of IT/BT firms and employees work for five days a week.
''We are afraid of voting percentage may be affected because of holidays in the State,” the BJP leaders said urging the Election Commission to seriously examine their demand.
The BJP leaders demanded the Election Commission to hold elections in the State on April 22 or 23 to ensure high per cent of voting in the State.
Archbishop of Bangalore Most Rev Dr Bernard Moras, who is also the President of Karnataka Regional Bishops Conference (KRCBC) and Karnataka United Christian Forum for Human Rights (KUCDHR), has urged the Election Commission of India and the State Election Commissioner to change the Lok Sabha polling date for Karnataka either before the start of the Holy Week from April 13 or after its end on April 19 as the period was the most important part of the 40-day Lent season culminating with the Easter Sunday.
The Archbishop, who along with the KRCBC Public Relations Officer and Secretary of KUCFHR Fr Ronnie Prabhu, Fr A A Anthony Swamy, PRO of Bangalore Archdiocese and Fr G Anthony Mahendran, Secretary to Archbishop, had recently submitted representations to be forwarded to the Election Commission of India.
The Archbishop in his representation said Karnataka’s polling date of April 17 falls on Thursday, which was being observed by the Christians as Maundy Thursday, and the religious as well as the faithful would find it extremely difficult to take part in the electoral process.
Archbishop Moras said holding elections during the Holy Week would cause serious inconveniences to the Catholics attending religious services in their respective churches.
The last three days of the Holy Week from Thursday to Sunday or from Apil 17 to 20 were ''the Most Holiest of Holy Days of the Holy Week,” the Archbishop said and pointed out the Christians meditate on the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
''On these days, we have services in all the churches and every Christian will attend the services without fail,” he said explaining that it would cause great inconvenience to the Christians.
Archbishop Moras also explained that many school teachers, government officers, police and other security personnel, who will be drafted on election related work would be deprived of taking part in the solemn Holy Week celebrations if Karnataka’s date of polling was not changed from April 17.
In addition, he pointed out that most of the schools run by Catholics and Christians would be taken over by the Election Commission for poll related work. The educational institutions would be taken over by the Election Commission authorities several days prior to the actual date of polling for security purposes and other preparations.
As most of the educational institutions belonging to the Catholic or Christian community were situated in the vicinity of the churches or church compounds and as experience shows that security personnel do not allow any movements near the schools designated for electoral work, the Christians would be put to lot of inconveniences in attending to the religious services, the Archbishop said.
''Therefore, we humbly request to either advance the polling date in Karnataka either between April 7 and 12 or postpone between April 21 and 26,” the Archbishop said in his representation.