People's faith in electronic voting machines (EVM) has eroded, said Congress leader Ghulam Nabi azad.
Rewind to the system that prevailed in 1951: that's what a delegation of opposition parties told the Election Commission when they met on Monday evening.
"In recent times, people's faith in electronic voting machines (EVM) has eroded and that's why the Commission should revert back to ballot papers," Congress' Ghulam Nabi Azad told reporters after an hour-long meeting with the Commission.
Mr Azad was accompanied by a host of opposition leaders from Left, Trinamool, DMK among others. In all, representatives of 16 Opposition parties signed a memorandum that was submitted to the Commission.
Though the Commission didn't issue a fresh statement today, opposition leaders claimed that they have "agreed to convene an all-party meeting to discuss the issue". Interestingly, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which has been at the frontlines of a sharp attack on the EVMs, wasn't party of the delegation.
But that didn't stop Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for making a fresh attack on the Election Commission. "I am an engineer from IIT and know the difference between tampering and a faulty machine," said the AAP chief. "EC is behaving like Dhritarashtra who wants his son Duryodhan to somehow occupy the seat of power," he said, also attacking the BJP with references to characters of the epic Mahabharata.
Also, while the memorandum questioned the results of Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh elections, it was totally silent on Punjab results that saw the Congress registering a comfortable win beating the BJP and its partner Akali Dal.
On Sunday, the Commission strongly defended the EVMs and said the machines were "robust and tamper proof". The Commission noted that the machines had an internal chip that couldn't be overwritten and couldn't be hacked as they were not connected to the internet.
The opposition, however, did not sound convinced and said they would meet the President of India on Wednesday to raise their concerns about EVMs.