Road Nahin, School Nahin to Vote Nahin, say villagers

The residents of Harigyan Ka Pura and Katelapura villages in Sainthri Panchayat under Pahargarh block staged a sit-in on Monday, announcing that they would boycott election unless their three demands are fulfilled.

The Morena Lok Sabha constituency is going to polls on Tuesday. There are 766 voters in these two villages. The agitators said that because there was no polling booth in their village, many citizens had been deprived of the right to vote.

There is only one polling booth in Sainthri which is three and a half kilometes away from their village.

Apart from that, there is no road which causes trouble to the elderly people and pregnant women, the villagers said. Not only that, as there is no school in the village, the children are deprived of education, they decided to boycott the election, the angry villagers said. They said, “Road Nahin to Vote Nahin; School Nahin to Vote Nahin.”

Villagers Munnalal Kushwaha, Dharmendra Kushwaha, Prahlad Kushwaha and Shivkumar Kushwaha said they had raised those issues before the Sarpanch and the district administration time and again, but no action was taken. Additional district magistrate and deputy electoral officer CB Prasad said that a team of officers had been sent to hold discussions with the villagers to convince them to cast votes.

After boycott call, villagers agree to vote

The residents of Noorpurvillate under Sumawali assembly constituency announced that they would not cast votes. On getting information, a team led by the district education officer rushed to the spot to hold talks with the villagers. The villagers demanded the administration to appoint teachers in the schools in their village.

District education officer (DEO) Anil Kumar Pathak held talks with collector Ankit Asthana and assured the villagers that two teachers would be appointed in the new academic session.