Delhi municipal polls to be held on April 22

Krishan Pratap Singh of the AAP, who has reportedly worked closely with the leaders in Punjab, today took to Twitter and wrote: “I’m afraid @ArvindKejriwal is poorly advised on reasons for AAP’s defeat in Punjab”. He did not say anything when AAP had won 67 seats in Delhi. But in the end, AAP got barely 25 per cent votes and the SAD got nearly 31 per cent. “If he is so anxious about UP and its results then why did they lose in Goa and Punjab, has he thought about that?”

Recently, the Supreme Court had mandated that VVPAT machines should be used in all the polls and thus the Election Commission had installed VVPAT machines in several constituencies.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) received a drubbing in Punjab where it bagged about two dozen seats out of the total 117 seats. 25-30 pc of AAP’s vote was transferred to SAD so Congress won election. However, Delhi High Court satisfied with detailed reply of ECI why EVM can not be rigged and about ECI efforts on developing VVPAT decided and disposed of the case in 2012 that VVPAT may be developed early in consultation with political parties.

In a statement issued from Chandigarh, Sharma said that Kejriwal’s statement was insulting on the people’s verdict of Punjab and have only exposed his immature political mindset.

The BJP responded by saying that there are “some defects” in Mayawati and not in the EVM.

Both Mayawati and Kejriwal could just be bitter losers as the Election Comission has a detailed explanation on the merits of EVMs. The results will be announced on 25 April. Kejriwal had campaigned vigorously in Punjab as well addressing more than 90 rallies and sabhas.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has written to the Election Commission not to use EVMs and rather conduct the polling through ballot system.

Delhi had a single municipal corporation but was divided into three before the 2012 polls with the then Congress chief minister Sheila Dikshit believing that her party could romp home comfortably in the elections. The demands, however, has been rejected by the state Election Commissioner SK Shrivastava. She said the Congress has a very clear stand, that it will not oppose any investigation into booth capturing, tampering of EVMs or into a complaint by any party on use of unlawful or illegal means.

Apart from moving court, the BSP supremo also said that the party would observe a black day every month against the “murder of democracy” by the BJP. And if things continue in this direction and losing parties regularly question election results, we will end up like Bangladesh where the electorally defeated lot never accept the people’s mandate and refuse to occupy the opposition benches in Parliament.

It is worth noticing that challenging the validity of the EVMs by losing parties have become a trend in recent times.

Before 2014, even BJP leader LK Advani had protested against the use of EVMs.

What’s all the fuss about VVPAT and EVMs? The poll panel said that it will “further enhance confidence of citizens in its electoral process by deploying paper audit trail (VVPAT) in a phased manner”.