A journalist from The Times of India was reportedly heckled and threatened by the local police in Rajasthan's Jaipur when he objected to a polling officer forcing people to vote for the Bharatiya Janata Party. Narrating the incident in a report published on the media house's website, Siddhartha Dutta said that he was touring election booths in the city when he visited Adarsh Nagar poll booth number 101 and found voters complaining about election malpractices.
The voters, in a Muslim majority area, told the reporter that apart from the usual problems like malfunctioning Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT), or names being left off the electoral roll, there was one particular polling officer who was forcing voters to press the button number 1, ascribed to the BJP.
The voters were shouting outside the booth when the reporter reached there and heard their problems. He tried to intervene in the situation, pointing out that the conduct of the polling officer was outright wrong. However, to his surprise, the local Station House Officer Raj Kumar Sharma heckled him and threatened to throw him behind bars. Dutta said he had taken the due press permissions to enter polling booths for the purpose of reporting.
The matter was resolved after the Deputy Commissioner of Police (East), Gaurav Yadav came and heard the reporter's complaint. Although the polling officer was removed from duty, no action was taken against the SHO.