13 May,2024 03:10 PM IST | Hyderabad | mid-day online correspondent
Screengrab of viral video/X
Bharatiya Janata Party's candidate for the Hyderabad seat for Lok Sabha Elections 2024, K Madhavi Latha was booked by election authorities on Monday after a video clip of her went viral in which she was asking burqa-clad women to show their faces to compare with the photo identity cards surfaced. Reportedly, she was also directing the policemen to allow voters into the polling booths only after a thorough check.
In the video, the BJP leader was seen asking the women voters at the pooling booth to lift their burqa and show their faces to verify their identity which sparked outrage among the public, reported PTI.
The Hyderabad Collector, taking to X (formerly Twitter), said that a case was registered against her at the Malakpet Police station. "A case is registered in Malakpet police station against Madhavi Latha, contesting candidate, BJP, under Sections 171C, 186, 505(1)(c) of IPC and Section 132 of the Representation of the People Act," the Collector wrote, per the news agency report.
The news agency report further stated that Section 171 C is concerned with interference or attempts to interfere with the free enjoyment of any electoral right. Section 186 deals with voluntarily hindering a public worker in performing a public function, whereas Section 505 deals with encouraging or likely instigating any class or community of people to commit an offence against another class or community.
Earlier, while speaking to the news agency ANI, Madhavi Latha said she had only "requested" the women and claimed that she was not in the wrong. She told ANI, "I am a candidate. As per law candidate has the right to check the ID cards without the facemasks. I am not a man, I am a woman and with a lot of humbleness, I have only requested them - can I please see and verify with the ID cards? If somebody wants to make a big issue out of it, that means they are scared."
She had initially made allegations of discrepancies in the voter list in her consitutecy and stated, "The Police personnel seem very dull, they are not active...They are not checking anything. Senior citizen voters are coming here but their names are deleted from the list. A few of them are residents of Goshamahal but their names are in the list of Rangareddy."
Polling for the total 17 seats during the fourth phase of Lok Sabha Elections 2024 was underway in Telangana. The BJP leader is taking on AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi in the Hyderabad Lok Sabha segment.
