NEW DELHI: The Election Commission on Tuesday ordered repoll in 123 polling stations across the three parliamentary constituencies of Kairana , Bhandara-Gondiya and Nagaland, apart from transferring the Gondiya collector in the wake of the high rate of VVPAT malfunction there.

The Commission, based on recommendations of its observers for the said constituencies, decided to hold fresh polling in 73 polling booths of Kairana, 49 in Bhandara-Gondiya and one in Nagaland. While the repolls in Kairana and Bhandara-Gondiya were necessitated due to disruption of polling as many faulty VVPATs had to be replaced with ‘reserve’ machines, the repoll in Nagaland was due to other factors.

A senior Commission official said the EC’s observers, who studied the reasons and impact of the malfunction of VVPATs, sought to blame a combination of factors for the fault. “The fact that the VVPATs were new machines, inadequate training of the polling staff and factors like light and heat may have together contributed to the malfunction, they felt. The observers took stock of the impact of VVPAT replacements on the polling pattern and accordingly recommended repoll in some polling booths. EC has accepted their recommendation,” said an EC functionary.

As many as 413 VVPATs (nearly 21% of the total machines deployed) had to be replaced in Bhandara-Gondiya after they developed a glitch, while the number of VVPATs replaced in Kairana was 355 (19%).

The EC on Tuesday afternoon also ordered the transfer of Gondiya collector and brought in his replacement ahead of the repoll, which will be held between 7 am and 6 pm on Wednesday. While EC chose not to give out the reason for shunting out the officer, sources attributed it to “dereliction of duty”. The Commission, incidentally, suspects that failure to ensure proper training of the polling staff may have led to poor handling of the VVPATs, causing them to malfunction.

As per the EC’s instructions, wide publicity may be given to the repoll by the beat of drums in the polling areas concerned.

When contacted, Chief Election Commissioner O P Rawat said VVPAT malfunction and the replacement was not unusual during polling. “It was last witnessed on a large-scale in Punjab assembly poll. In one constituency, 35% of the total machines deployed had to be replaced on account of malfunction. In most of the constituencies that went to bypolls, VVPATs were used for the first time. Unlike EVMs which the polling staff is well trained to handle by now, there may some issue relating to the handling of VVPATs in places where they are being used for the first time. In any case, all faulty VVPATs were replaced (on Monday) and polling went on smoothly. As for EVMs, the rate of the malfunction was well within the normal range of 1%,” he said.

Asked if the high rate of VVPAT malfunction in Monday’s bypoll had cast doubts on EC’s plan to hold 2019 poll fully with VVPATs, Rawat said the Commission, on the contrary, was fully geared for the same. “There are no doubts whatsoever. We are prepared in every way,” he told TOI.

