Losers Kejriwal, Mayawati say EVMs to blame
NEW DELHI: Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal claimed on Wednesday that rigged voting machines transferred his party’s votes to the SAD-BJP combine in Punjab while BSP chief Mayawati said she would seek court help for a probe into “tampering” in Uttar Pradesh.
Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party finished a distant second in Punjab with 20 seats, as the Congress stormed to power with 77 in the 117-member assembly.
Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party was decimated in Uttar Pradesh, getting just 19 seats in the 403-strong assembly.
While rivals, barring the Congress, have been dismissive of their claims, the Election Commission has said EVMs can’t be tampered with.
“He (Kejriwal) has lost his mental balance so he is saying things like this. He did not say anything when AAP won 67 seats in Delhi,” Union minister and Shiromani Akali Dal leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal said in Delhi.
Her party, which is led by husband Sukhbir and has an alliance with the BJP, was voted out of Punjab after 10 years and finished third behind the AAP but with a higher voter share.
“Many said that there is anger against Akalis and AAP is sweeping the polls. Still, AAP got 25% votes and SAD got 31%. How is that possible?” Kejriwal said.
He alleged that around 20-25% of his party’s votes may have been “transferred” to the SADBJP because EVMs were tinkered with.
The AAP was counting on a Delhi-like poll debut in Punjab to go national but poll results fell way short of its expectations.
The people of Punjab had thrown out the AAP and Kejriwal “should do vipassana”, the minister said, a reference to a meditation technique that the Dekhi CM practices.
While he took responsibility for the poor performance, Kejriwal demanded that the Election Commission count votes of verifiable paper trail-enabled EVMs to “restore credibility of the EVMs”.
The poll panel had paper-trail EVMs in some polling booths. The paper is a printout that allows a voter to see if the vote has gone to the candidate it was intended for.
“Developed countries have given up EVMs. Should we not rethink? Even the BJP including (LK) Advaniji had said EVMs can be tampered with,” said Kejriwal, who has asked for ballot papers to be used in the next month’s Delhi civic elections.
We will observe ‘black day’... in UP and other state headquarters on the 11th of every month MAYAWATI, Bahujan Samaj Party chief
Mayawati, who has dismissed the Uttar Pradesh assembly election results and said tampering of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) was responsible for her party’s poor showing, announced on Wednesday the BSP will launch a nationwide agitation on the issue from April 11.
“The BSP workers will organise dharna and demonstrations in Lucknow as well as other district headquarters on the 11th of every month to observe March 11, the day of UP election results, as a black day,” the Bahujan Samaj Party chief said while addressing a press conference in Lucknow.
Mayawati, a former UP CM who was expected to grab a substantial share of the votes, blamed EVMs for the BJP unexpected bumper victory in India’s largest state and shot off a complaint to the Election Commission to cancel the election results. The poll panel, however, wrote to BSP’s national general secretary Satish Misra saying it found no merit in the allegations, and the “prayers made in your letter are not legally tenable”. Mayawati rejected the EC’s reply on her demand for a probe into EVM tampering and said her party will file a petition in the court on this issue. Earlier, Mayawati visited Kanshi Ram memorial to pay tribute to the BSP founder on his 83rd birth anniversary. Invoking Kanshi Ram and Dr BR Ambedkar, she said, “Both the leaders worked for the empowerment of Dalits.”
BSP LEADERS RESIGN
Former minister KK Gautam and BSP chief Mayawati’s former OSD Ganga Ram Ambedkar resigned from the party on Wednesday. They blamed Mayawati for the UP assembly poll debacle. Around two dozen BSP office bearers have quit various posts in the party and announced support to Gautam.