Cong, EC tussle over MP, Raj voters’ lists

Congress petitioners must be punished for fabricating the voters’ list VIKAS SINGH, Advocate for EC

NEWDELHI: The Election Commission (EC) and the Congress were again locked in a tussle on Thursday, with the poll panel accusing the party of fabricating the voters’ list in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan to make a false claim of duplication of names, and the principal opposition party denying the EC’s charge.

Congress leaders Kamal Nath and Sachin Pilot have moved the Supreme Court alleging duplication of voters in the voters’ list in the two poll-bound states.

Senior advocate Vikas Singh, who argued the case for EC, told a bench led by justice AK Sikri that the party was trying to “mislead” the top court. “Congress petitioners must be punished for fabricating the voters’ list,” the lawyer said, contenting that the list presented before the court had photos and names that had been fudged. Singh said the list on the EC website does not carry photographs of the voters.

When asked about the EC’s contention, Kamal Nath, the Congress party’s Madhya Pradesh chief, said: “We stand by the evidence that we have submitted.”

In their plea, Nath and Pilot, who is the party’s Rajasthan chief, have also raised allegations of tampering with Voter Verifiable Paper Trail (VVPAT) machine, which allows voters to verify if their vote has gone to the intended candidate. Nath has also sought verification of 10% of polling stations in every constituency and demanded the voters’ list in a text format.

The Congress lawyer, Kabil Sibal, rebutted the EC’s allegations and told the Supreme Court that the list it had submitted was “whatever was available in the public domain”, and the same list was carried by the electronic media. The same list is with the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) in the form of CDs, Sibal added.

At this, the bench asked Singh to seek instructions from the chief election commission’s office and submit a reply on October 8.

In the last hearing, senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Nath and Pilot, said a survey conducted by Nath in Madhya Pradesh had found over six million duplicate names.

Rejecting the Congress plea, the EC, in an affidavit, objected to the national party moving the top court time and again on different electoral issues, including faulty electoral rolls, use of VVPAT machines and alleged tampering with and malfunctioning of electronic voting machines. A party cannot keep interfering with its functioning in this manner, EC told the court.