Sudhir Singh, a resident of Ranchi, went to the booth number 64 to cast his vote. “When I used the EVM button and put my finger on lotus symbol of the BJP, the hand symbol of the Congress sounded the bip sound” ,,Singh claims. *When Ashok Kumar, a resident of Jamshedpur,pressed the lotus symbol on the EVM, it made no bip sound. “No other party’s symbol got the bip sound either”, complains Kumar. *Neeta Kumari, a resident of Patliputra,cribs that though she had pressed the lotus symbol on the EVM, it did not respond. Singh, Kumar and Kumari are no strange cases. Like them are scrores of electorates who complain that inspite of pressing the button on lotus symbol of the BJP, their votes were not cast in its favour.”I lodged the complaint with the presiding officer. He said he will look into his complaint.But nothing happened”, Kumari said. Inquiry revealed that the EVMs used by the Election Commission of India carried inbuilt error. In fact, an EVM consists of two Units – a Control Unit and a Balloting Unit – joined by a five-meter cable. The Control Unit is with the Presiding Officer or a Polling Officer and the Balloting Unit is placed inside the voting compartment. Instead of issuing a ballot paper, the Polling Officer in-charge of the Control Unit was supposed to press the Ballot Button to l enable the voter to cast his vote by pressing the blue button on the Balloting Unit in favour of the candidate and symbol of his choice. “The problem was suspectedly rooted in Control unit. When the presiding officer pressed the ballot Button and the voter followed suit in favour of the candidate and symbol of his choice, the vote was either cast in favour of the Congress party’s candidate and its hand symbol or did not register his vote at all”, said a senior officer who does not want to be named. “We are in dark as to how this problem occurred in the EVMs”, he added.
Posted on: Mon, 21 Apr 2014 11:18:31 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015