SHILLONG: Meghalaya Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) F.R. Kharkongor on Friday held a meeting with representatives of all political parties in the State to inform them about the new mobile application launched by the Election Commission of India (ECI) which is supposed to ensure safety and movement of the electronic voting machines (EVMs).
The meeting was attended by representatives of Congress, UDP, HSPDP, NCP and BJP.
It is learnt that the new application can track the movement of the EVMs. The exercise will be presented before the political parties later this week.
During the meeting, the UDP raised the issue of service holders like army personnel who have been enrolled in the last electoral drive, to which the CEO said he would seek clarity on the matter from the Election Commission.
In the meeting, NCP members asked the CEO to publicize the actual guidelines during the enrolment as many times, voters are asked different kinds of papers which put them on to the back foot as far as enrolment as voters is concerned.
The CEO asked the political parties to appoint booth level agents to ensure that enrolment is done in the most transparent manner.
However, the UDP demanded that the State Election department should use voter verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) in the 2018 Assembly elections to ensure free and fair polls as all political parties in 2010 had resolved that the EVMs should be done away with.
It may be mentioned that voter verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) or verified paper record (VPR) is a method of providing feedback to voters using a ballot less voting system and the system is intended as an independent verification system for voting machines designed to allow voters to verify that their vote was cast correctly, to detect possible election fraud or malfunction.
