NEW DELHI – Amid growing chorus questioning the reliability of electronic voting machines (EVMs), Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal has directed chief secretary MM Kutty to write to the state election commissioner asking him to hold the upcoming municipal elections through ballot papers.
“The state government recommendation comes following requests from several political parties to hold local body polls through ballot paper, as is done in many states,” an AAP functionary said.
The state election commission is likely to announce later today the date for election to the three municipal corporations likely in April this year.
Delhi Congress chief Ajay Maken also wrote to Kejriwal earlier today demanding the use of ballot papers instead of EVMs. “Serious doubts have cropped up in the minds of voters as to the free and fair nature of electoral process. We demand that these elections should be held using the traditional ballot system,” he wrote.
Following the landslide victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, Bahujan Samaj Party supremo had openly questioned the reliability of EVMs.
The BJP leaders have been criticising such demands arguing that if EVMs could be tampered in favour of the ruling party at the Centre, how did Mahagathbandhan (coalition of JD (U), RJD and Congress in Bihar) and AAP recorded clean sweep in Bihar and Delhi assembly elections in 2015.
Delhi BJP president Manoj Tiwari told ANI that Kejriwal should also demand re-election in 67 of the 70 assembly seats in Delhi from where his party won in 2015.
Though the AAP leadership has desisted from attributing the party’s loss in Punjab to faulty EVMs, Kejriwal retweeted former co-worker Prashant Bhushan’s tweet targetting BJP on the issue on Tuesday.
“Those who screamed “democracy at risk due to EVMs” while in opposition, are now celebrating “democracy by EVMs”, once in power,” Bhushan tweeted.
