As the country is all set for the counting of votes for the Lok Sabha elections on June 4, the opposition INDIA bloc on Sunday strongly objected to the Election Commission changing the rule about the counting of postal ballots.
A delegation of the grouping met the EC officials and urged them to ensure that the postal ballots are counted first and their results declared before the outcome of the Electronic Voting Machines is announced.
The delegation led by Congress leader Abhishek Singhvi further stressed that the poll panel should issue clear guidelines on the counting process and ensure that those are implemented.
"This is the third multi-party delegation visiting the EC during this process.... We spent time with the EC on two-three major issues. Most important was counting the postal ballots and declaring the results first. This is a very clearly stated statutory rule, which specifically says that you should take up the postal ballots first," Singhvi later told the media.
The Congress leader said under the existing rule 54-A, the counting of the postal ballots has to be completed in any case before the counting through the EVMs is completed. “It is a rule that if the counting of the postal ballots is not completed, the result of the counting through EVMs cannot be declared. This is because the postal ballots can completely swing the results and impact the final outcome,” he said.
Singhvi further asserted that a statutory rule cannot be changed by a guideline. “We are only asking the implementation of the existing rules,” he said.
The INDIA bloc leaders submitted a letter to the EC in which they claimed that the number of postal ballots has gone up significantly in this Lok Sabha election as senior citizens (aged 85 years and above) and differently-abled persons were allowed to cast their votes through this process.
In another letter submitted to the poll panel, the opposition leader complained that even as political parties have put in a lot of effort to train their counting agents, the counting officials often fail to fully understand all aspects of the counting process.
CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury said the leaders have requested the EC to ensure that its own guidelines are implemented. The guidelines include ensuring that the control units of the EVMs are moved through CCTV-monitored corridors and a verification of the date-and-time display of the control units is done.