The names of Infosys co-founder and Aadhaar architect Nandan Nilekani and brokerage platform Zerodha’s founders Nikhil Kamath and Nithin Kamath have been flagged for discrepancies by the Election Commission as part of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Karnataka.
NDTV has learnt that Nilekani’s name was placed under the ‘Unmapped with Last SIR’ category, indicating that officials could not establish a match with the previous electoral database.
Nikhil and Nithin Kamath have been reportedly flagged over a parent-name mismatch when compared with the older electoral database.
Nilekani and the Kamaths are not isolated cases. Several eminent personalities have been served notices as part of the SIR exercise in Karnataka.
Eminent scientist and Bharat Ratna recipient CNR Rao, Padma awardee activist Harekala Hajabba, and Kannada actor Shivaraj Kumar have also received SIR notices.
Read |Â Bharat Ratna Scientist CNR Rao Gets SIR Notice Over Extra ‘F’ In ‘Prof’
Prof CNR Rao. (Right) Harekala Hajabba
Scientist CNR Rao, whose work in some of the most complex areas of chemistry unlocked new paths of understanding, has been served a notice over “self-name mismatch” under the voter roll clean-up exercise in Karnataka. His name appears in the older electoral rolls as ‘Prof CNR Rao’, while it appears as ‘Proff CNR Rao’ – with the extra ‘f’.
Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) had clarified yesterday that a notice issued to activist Harekala Hajabba was due to a mismatch in his name in the electoral records and that the issue had been resolved. Hajabba is a Padma Shri awardee.
The matter had caused a surprise in Mangaluru where Hajabba is widely known for his social work and for building a school in his village, using money he earned by selling oranges in Mangaluru. That brought him the national honour.
In the case of Shivaraj Kumar, his voter record has also reportedly been flagged as unmapped during the exercise. His name and his father’s name in the electoral records have been cited as part of the verification issue.
The names of more than one crore voters were removed from Karnataka’s draft list published on August 24 as part of SIR. The excluded names amount to 19.4% of the state’s electorate.
The poll panel had said at the time that notices will be sent to 43 lakh persons whose enumeration forms either had anomalies or those who had not been mapped.