AGRA: The Uttar Pradesh State Election Commission (SEC) will use the electronic voting machines (EVMs) which were used in

earlier. The machines had been at the centre of a controversy with opposition politicians alleging the machines had been rigged to help

candidates win. What has also raised concern among opposition parties in UP is the

’s decision not to use Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trails (VVPATs) to cross-verify the votes cast, "because of shortage".

Ved Prakash Verma, additional election commissioner of Uttar Pradesh, said, “We are going to use 40,000 control units and 72,000 ballot units to conduct elections for councilors and mayors in 16 municipal corporations across the state. Of these, 12,000 control units and 16,000 ballot units are owned by the UP SEC. The rest have been brought from MP.”

Verma added, “Since there is shortage of VVPATs with Election Commission of India (ECI) as well as with UP SEC, we have decided not to use it. ECI had sent VVPATs to

and Gujarat for assembly election and it will be impossible to re-configure them for the civic bodies’ elections here.”

In April this year, a major controversy had erupted in MP over these EVMs, amid charges of them being rigged to favour the BJP. This had followed a demonstration by the MP SEC of the machines in front of media persons, in which the infallibility of the machines could not be conclusively demonstrated.

Reacting to the UP SEC’s decision, Sunil Singh Sajan, state spokesperson of

, said, “Wherever VVPAT was used, BJP has lost the election. In April, during a demonstration of EVMs in Bhind, MP, we all saw the problem with the machine. In the era of technology, anything is possible. ECI should ensure that all concerns of parties are addressed. They should use VVPATs for election, or questions will be raised on the commission’s credibility.”

Ashok Singh, state spokesperson of

, said, “The SEC must get all the machines inspected in a transparent way before deploying them for election. We will raise our concerns about the MP EVMs in an upcoming meeting with the commission.”

The 16 municipal corporations where elections will be conducted using EVMs are Agra, Firozabad, Aligarh, Meerut, Mathura, Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Varanasi, Allahabad, Jhansi, Kanpur Nagar, Faizabad, Bareilly, Moradabad, Ghaziabad and Saharanpur.