Assembly elections 2018: Madhya Pradesh HC dismisses Congress' plea in connection with 'EVM malfunction'

The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Friday dismissed the plea filed by Congress in connection with malfunctioning of Electronic Voters Machine (EVM). 

The court, while dismissing the plea, refused to interfere in the matter and expressed satisfaction on the steps that the Election Commission (EC) is taking towards it. 

The court also reserved its decision over plea filed over the countring of VVPAT slips along with that of EVMs.

Two petitions were filed on Tuesday in the Madhya Pradesh High Court in connection with EVMs used in the state assembly polls held on November 28.

Congress leader Naresh Saraf sought direction from the high court to set up a special investigation team (SIT) to probe alleged irregularities in the handling of reserve electronic voting machines (EVMs) in Bhopal, Satna, Sagar, Shahjapur and Khandwa.

The petitioner's counsel Shashank Shekhar said no separate facility was created to keep the unused reserve EVMs after polling was held.

These were kept within the vicinity of EVMs used in polling in all the assembly seats, Shekhar alleged.

The petition sought direction to the Election Commission to reveal the number of EVMs under the unused, reserve category. It also sought punishment for authorities for alleged dereliction of election duty, he informed.

The other petition, filed by advocate Amitabh Gupta, sought direction from the high court for counting of the slips of VVPAT machines used in the November 28 polling.

The voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) unit is used to verify that a vote polled by a voter goes to the chosen candidate.

Gupta said no additional infrastructure is required to carry the counting of the slips in VVPAT machines. He said the slips of VVPAT machines must be tallied with the votes polled in the EVM for all 230 Assembly constituencies that went to polls on November 28.

Counting of votes will take place on December 11.

(With Agency Inputs)