Haryana polls: Congress doubles down on allegations, demands sealing of EVMs with “99%” battery

New Delhi [India], October 9 (ANI): A day after raising concerns over the results of Haryana assembly elections where the party suffered an ‘unexpected’ loss, the Congress party said it has demanded the Election Commission of India to seal those EVMs, which were allegedly having high battery percentage despite being used the whole day, until the investigation is completed in the matter.

A delegation of Congress leaders including KC Venugopal, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Ashok Gehlot Pratap Singh Bajwa, Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera, Ajay Maken and Uday Bhan went to meet the Election Commission of India to address their concerns over the results of Haryana assembly polls.

Addressing the media persons after the meeting, Congress leader Pawan Khera said that they have informed the ECI about the 20 complaints they received from the 20 constituencies, out of which, seven are written complaints. The party said that ECI has assured them of looking into the matter.

“Today, KC Venugopal, Ashok Gehlot, Jairam Ramesh, Ajay Maken, Bhupinder Singh Hooda and other party leaders met the officials of ECI. We told ECI about the 20 complaints of which 7 are in written complaints from 7 constituencies. There were machines that were at 99 per cent and other normal machines were at 60-70 per cent on the day of counting. We demanded that those machines should be sealed and secured until the investigation is complete. We also told ECI that in the next 48 hours, we will also present the remaining complaints to them,” he said.

Khera asserted that the Election Commission has assured they will look into the matter and will reply, after consulting returning officers from each constituency.

Referring to the 7 written complaints, Khera said that they recieved complaints from Karnal, Hodal, Panipat City, Kalka, Rewari, Narnaul and Kalanwali constituencies.

Congress leader Pawan Khera said “The Election Commission has assured us that they will look into this matter and they will reply to us after consulting their returning officers from each constituency. Complaints were from 20 Assembly constituencies. We have 7 written complaints, from Karnal, Hodal, Panipat City, Kalka, Rewari, Narnaul and Kalanwali. We have presented the documents of the complaints to ECI. Complaints from 13 more Assembly constituencies will be submitted to ECI in the next 48 hours. There were similar complaints from Chhattisgarh, we have reminded them of these complaints also.”

Reiterating the results as “surprising’, former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said that the Election Commission has given assurance and is looking into their complaints.

“These results of Haryana are surprising because everyone thought that Congress will form the government in Haryana. Be it IB, experts, survey reports, but what happened was that when the counting of postal ballots started, Congress was leading everywhere, but when the counting of EVMs started, Congress was lagging behind. We have received many complaints. The counting of votes was delayed in several places. The Election Commission has assured us that they are looking into all the complaints…” Hooda said.

Haryana Congress president Udai Bhan, who was also present in the delegation, raised concerns over the batteries of the EVMs, saying that if a battery is used whole day, it can’t be 99 per cent.

Bhan said, “We have put forward all the issues as to how EVMs have been hacked. The Chief Minister (Nayab Saini) himself said that all the arrangements have been made and we will form the government, then this is all a matter of doubt…When the battery is used the whole day, then it will definitely go down, it cannot be 99%. We told the Election Commission about it…We want VVPAT slips to be matched with EVMs so that the truth can be revealed.”

Earlier, expressing concerns over the results of the Haryana assembly election, Congress party had described it as “totally unexpected, completely surprising, counter-intuitive and against ground-reality and said “it is not possible” for the party “to accept the results”.

However, the Election Commission referred to remarks of Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh and Pawan Khera, saying their comments that “results are not acceptable” had been reported in the media.

“Such an unprecedented statement as above in a generic sense, unheard in the rich democratic heritage of the country, is far from a legitimate part of free speech and expression and moves towards an undemocratic rejection of the will of the people expressed in accordance with the Statutory and Regulatory electoral framework, uniformly applied across all elections in the country including J-K and Haryana,” the poll panel said in its letter.