Bangalore: Election officials have seized cash, household articles and liquor worth Rs 10.64 crore across the State in the last two days.
Speaking to reporters, Anil Kumar Jha, Chief Electoral Officer, said that Rs 78 lakh in cash was seized along with the vehicle and four people arrested at Varadahalli checkpost in Ramanagar district.
In Bangalore, an unaccounted sum of Rs 71 lakh in Chamarajpet, Rs eight lakh in Cottonpet and Rs 18 lakh in Nelamangala were seized.
In Chitradurga, cash worth of Rs 11 lakh was seized, while at Hosahodya checkpost in Doddaballapur, Rs 4.75 lakh was seized along with 140 bags of 25 kg rice. At Kyatsandra in Tumkur district, Rs 4.5 lakh was seized. At Alluru in Kudligi taluk of Bellary district, Rs 3.75 lakh was seized.“So far, we have seized Rs 7.76 crore cash ever since the model code of conduct came into effect,” said Jha.
The flying squad also seized household and electrical goods worth Rs 13 lakh in Athani town in Belgaum district, while utensils worth Rs four lakh were seized in Thippagondanahalli in Gauribidanur. In Kudligi of Bellary district, 4.5 kg of silver ornaments worth Rs 2.15 lakh were seized. As many as 2,183 litres of liquor have been seized in Davangere, Gadag and Gulbarga, taking the total liquor seized in Karnataka to 42,823 litres.
Jha told reporters that Belgaum has topped with 188 cases of poll code violations while Mysore stood second with 170 cases and Chikkaballapur third with 163 cases. So far, no cases of election-related violations have been reported in Udupi.
In the wake of litterateurs U R Ananthamurthy and Girish Karnad endorsing a particular party’s candidates, journalists asked him whether their pictures in schools and government buildings will be removed. However, Jha said no such decisions have been taken.
“Their pictures have been put up at schools and government buildings for their contributions to literature. We have no such plans to remove their photos.” He, however, confirmed receiving a complaint in this regard.
