Agartala: Election Commission of India (ECI) has assured Tripura Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) of using updated version of newly-procured Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) for upcoming Assembly election in the state.
TPCC president Sudip Roybarman informed that an eight-member delegation of the party had met the commission on Tuesday in New Delhi and handed over a memorandum on use of new EVMs in next election besides allegation against ruling party of electoral manipulation.
“We have been assured that full-proof EVMs would be used in coming Assembly election because we are convinced the existing EVMs, used in elections since 2008 Assembly polls, are being tempered with at the behest of the ruling Left Front,” Mr Roybarman stated.
He, however, pointed out that ECI was informed in detail about the alleged manipulation of elections by the ruling Left Front in past few years, including tempering electoral roll and mobilising the administration in favour of them.
Mr Barman expressed reservations over the old EVMs kept under the custody of the state election department and stated that there was sufficient scope of manipulating the memory of the machines before their use for voting.
“Since EVMs are engineered by human beings and it was left with the state government custody for long time, there is every possibility of tempering the machine at behest of the ruling party and this fact can not be ignored,” Mr Barman apprehended.
The new EVMs with in-built mechanism against tampering were needed to be used in the next Assembly election, otherwise, this machines would pave the way of victory of the ruling party, as it had already been mishandled by the engineers and employees owing direct allegiance to the CPI (M), he added. (UNI)