Mumbai: The Maharashtra Congress has alleged that the Election Commission of India (ECI) tinkered with the poll processes in the recent state Assembly elections that saw the rout of the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), here on Thursday.
Amid the growing clamour for return to ballot paper voting, state Congress President Nana F. Patole cited the poll figures and raised grave doubts on the abrupt hike in voting percentage in just a day’s time.
As per the ECI’s data, the voter turnout was 58.22 per cent at 5 p.m. on November 20 (election day), which shot up to 65.02 per cent at 11.30 p.m. that night. The next morning the turnout figure catapulted to 66.05 per cent the next day (November 21).
“This led to a total increase of 7.83 per cent voting, creating huge misgivings,” Patole told mediapersons.
He claimed that by this spurt of 7.83 per cent in just one day, there was an increase of almost 76 lakh votes and demanded to know how the voting percentage increased so dramatically in barely 24 hours, especially when the ECI provides updates every two hours.
“This means that the ECI has robbed the peoples’ votes. We have discussed the threadbare at our meeting today. We shall seek legal remedies and also launch mass movements,” declared Patole.
The party meeting included top leaders like CWC Member and state Working President M. Arif Naseem Khan, Vice-President Nana Gawande, ex-ministers Vijay Balasaheb Thorat, K.C. Padavi, Yashomati Thakur, Vishwajeet Kadam, besides MLC Bhai Jagtap, and other bigwigs
Slamming the ECI’s inefficiency given the huge discrepancies in the voting data, Patole pointed out that considering the significant increase in voter turnout after 5 p.m. hrs on November 20, there should have been long queues outside polling stations.
“We demand that the ECI should provide the evidence of such queues, release CCTV footage from the polling booths and other details of November 20,” Patole said, wondering why the ECI did not conduct the customary media briefing post-polling that day.
He said that experts from various fields across the country have raised suspicions about the sudden increase in voter turnout, casting serious doubts on the ECI’s credibility, and now the poll body must respond to the queries of the political parties, candidates, experts and the people.
Patole made it clear that the Congress is not highlighting the issue simply because of its defeat “but to protect the democracy and the Constitution”, and accused the ECI of making a mockery of both by colluding with the Bharatiya Janata Party.
All the MVA allies including Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (SP) President Sharad Pawar, General Secretary Jitendra Awhad, state President Jayant R. Patil, and leaders of Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Sanjay Raut, Sushma Andhare, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Kishore Tiwari, have cried foul over the alleged role of EVMs in the ‘totally unexpected’ results.
Other MVA partners like Communist Party of India (Marxist), Peasants & Workers Party, and several more opposition outfits like Raj Thackeray’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, Prakash Ambedkar’s Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, Omprakash B. alias Bachhu Kadu’s Prahar Janshakti Party have raised the cudgels against EVMs, with many leaders even demanding a re-election in the state.
(IANS)
