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Updated: Apr 23, 2019 23:20 IST

Opposition leaders across the country complained of malfunctioning electronic voting machines (EVMs) and linked voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines in the third and largest phase of the 17th Lok Sabha elections on Tuesday, alleging that votes in several places were being credited only to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) no matter who they had ben cast for.

Leaders of the Congress, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Telugu Desam Party (TDP), Trinamool Congress (TMC), Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Communist Party of India (CPI), the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPI(M), and the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) held a press conference in Mumbai to allege that EVMs were being manipulated.

NCP chief Sharad Pawar said the manipulation of EVMs was the only “worrying factor” at a time when the mood of the nation is favouring change. “EVMs are vulnerable to programming errors,” TDP leader N Chandrababu Naidu said. EVMs can be manipulated, hacked and even malfunction because of technical reasons, he said. AAP leader Sanjay Singh said Election Commission was acting like Dhritrashtra, the blind father of the Kauravas in the epic Mahabharata.

“You press any button, the vote goes to the BJP,” he said.

At a news briefing in the evening, deputy election commissioner Sudeep Jain said: “Out of total 2,81,436 ballot units deployed, 1,593 had to be replaced, while out of 2,11,158 control units, only 1,225 had to be replaced.”

Some of India’s tallest leaders — including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former PM Manmohan Singh, BJP president Amit Shah, Union finance minister Arun Jaitley, and Pawar — voted in the third phase, in which a provisional 65.97% voters turned out, according to data released by the election commission at 10pm.



Opposition parties have complained about malfunctioning EVMs and VVPAT machines in all three rounds of voting so far. On Tuesday, when polling covered 117 seats spread over 13 states and two union territories, involving 188 million voters, glitches led to delays in the start of voting in numerous polling booths across the country.

These parties have insisted on the manual counting of at least 50% of paper trail votes on VVPAT machines to ensure that the elections are fair. The Election Commission has rejected the demand saying it was not possible because of staff constraints and can lead to long delays in declaring election results, which are due out on May 23.

“Counting of 50% of VVPAT votes is a reasonable demand,” Congress leader and former home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde said in Mumbai.

Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav alleged that the EVMs were either “malfunctioning or voting for the BJP” across the country, after SP candidates in Rampur, Mainpuri and Badaun in Uttar Pradesh complained of faulty machines.

“EVMs across India malfunctioning or voting for the BJP. DMs (district magistrates) say poll officials untrained to operate EVMs.. 350+ being replaced. This is criminal negligence for a polling exercise that costs ₹50,000 crores,” Yadav tweeted.

SP candidate from Rampur Azam Khan’s son Abdullah Khan alleged that over 300 EVMs had been tampered with in Muslim-dominated areas, which had slowed voting. Uttar Pradesh’s additional chief electoral officer Brahma Dev Ram Tiwari denied the claim and said there were no widespread problems with the machines in Rampur.

The SP candidate in Badaun, Dharmendra Yadav, lodged a complaint with the EC over malfunctioning of the EVMs. Ten Lok Sabha seats went to the polls in UP on Tuesday.

In Goa, where voting for two Lok Sabha and three assembly seats was held, the opposition Congress and AAP alleged that during voting drills all votes had been polled only for the BJP. Leader of the opposition in the Goa assembly, Chandrakant Kavlekar, said EVMs in Cuncolim and Quepem assembly segments during a drill registered votes only for the BJP.

A vote each is cast for each candidate during the drill to check the efficacy of the machine in the presence of the candidates’ polling agents. AAP’s South Goa Lok Sabha candidate Elvis Gomes claimed that during the drill at a booth in Cuncolim, the votes registered were more than those polled.

In Kerala, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan said election officials appeared to have failed to ensure that the EVMs worked properly. “I myself had to wait for a while and I was told that the EVMs are not working. I am also told that this is the case in other places,” Vijayan told journalists in Kannur after he voted.

Kerala’s chief electoral officer Tikaram Meena said some EVMs had developed technical snags due to moisture seeping in following heavy rains on Monday night. He said the faulty machines had been replaced to minimise delays in starting the voting process. A 21-year-old man Ebin Babu was also arrested after for lodging a “false” complaint of EVM malfunction in a booth, where he cast his vote, and was later released on bail, police said.

In Gujarat, where polling for all 26 Lok Sabha seats took place, state’s chief electoral officer S Murlikrishna said there were some complaints of EVMs malfunctioning during the drills and all those machines had been replaced.

In West Bengal, where polling for five seats took place, EVM failures were reported from some polling booths in two Lok Sabha constituencies. In Assam, there were complaints of EVM malfunction in all the four seats that went to the polls on Tuesday.

In Bihar, voting was stopped in three polling booths in Araria after EVMs malfunctioned and technical glitches were reported . In Karnataka, technical glitches in EVMs and VVPT machines were reported from many polling stations in the 14 Lok Sabha seats that went to polls. “Though there are reports from some booths about glitches in EVMs or VVPATs, they have been rectified or replaced to begin or resume voting,” joint chief electoral officer AV Surya Sen said.

Former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi said that the commission had conducted performance review of the machines, which showed that while aggregate malfunction rate for the EVMs was 5%, that for VVPAT machines was around 11%. “The EVMs are like calculators which are solid state devices with long trouble-free performances and VVPATs are analogous to printers which are electro-magnetic devices having moving parts and therefore, encounter more frequent issues. The EC provides for spare machines for quick replacement and therefore, the problem is resolves in quick time,”he said.

Former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi said the commission had conducted a performance review of the machines, which showed that while the aggregate malfunction rate for the EVMs was 5%, that for VVPAT machines was around 11%.

“The EVMs are like calculators which are solid state devices with long trouble-free performances and VVPATs are analogous to printers which are electro-magnetic devices having moving parts and therefore, encounter more frequent issues. The EC provides for spare machines for quick replacement and therefore, the problem is resolved in quick time,”he said.

(With inputs from state bureaus and agencies)