Coimbatore : Despite continuous requests of tribals to provide vehicle support to reach polling booths during elections, their pleas have not been accepted by officials as any such facility has not been offered even during the upcoming general elections.
Coimbatore : Despite continuous requests of tribals to provide vehicle support to reach polling booths during elections, their pleas have not been accepted by officials as any such facility has not been offered even during the upcoming general elections.
Of the 120 tribal settlements in the Coimbatore District, most of them lie deep inside the reserve forest where mobility is not possible. Some of the settlements do not even have proper roads.
More than 10000 voters from these settlements will be casting their votes. To help them, 54 polling booths have been set up by the District Administration with all necessary facilities including electricity, which was provided for the first time in a few booths.
Though the booths have been set up to help all the settlements to cast votes without much hue and cry, mobility is seen as a major problem by the tribes.
According to tribes living in the Siruvani forests, they have been requesting for transportation atleast during election days for a long time. However, their queries have fallen on deaf years.
“There are many old people in the settlements who find it difficult to walk long distances. Our polling booth is located a few kilo meters away from our settlement and we are forced to walk inside thick forest risking our lives to vote,” said one of the tribal settlements in Siruvani.
She further added that some of the take rented vehicles to travel to the polling stations.
Commenting on the issue, District Collector K. Rajamani said that they had requested the State Election Commission to offer support. However, the State has not come forward to provide transportation for the voters of tribal settlements.
He further said that the administration had made sure that all facilities including proper roads, vehicle support for booth officials and other basic facilities.
“We have also requested the forest department to offer protection from wild animals,” he said.