Six Months After Defeat In Odisha, BJD Questions Integrity Of Poll Process

After the Opposition parties belonging to the INDIA bloc, Odisha's opposition Biju Janata Dal or BJD has red-flagged the unexplainable variances in the voting figures from the Lok Sabha and state assembly elections held earlier this year. Former Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's party has made it clear that they are not against Electronic Voting Machines, questioning instead the integrity of the election process.

A delegation of senior party leaders - including Amar Patnaik and Sasmit Patra -- met the Chief Election Commissioner and his team in Delhi today, six months after the party suffered a massive defeat at both Lok Sabha and the state level.

The BJD, which has been ruling the state for five consecutive terms, won only 51 of the state's 153 assembly constituencies. The BJP won 78 and in a first, came to power in the state. The party also won 20 of the state's 21 Lok Sabha seats.

The BJD has now given a memorandum to the Election Commission asking about the discrepancies - especially why there is a huge gap between the total votes polled in a booth and the votes counted from the EVMs.

The BJD has also pointed out how the total votes polled for the Lok Sabha election was different from the number of votes cast for the assembly segments that come under it.

In a first in Odisha, the voting percentage difference between polling day turnout and the final turnout figure is 15 per cent to 30 per cent.
In Keonjhar constituency, from where Chief Minister Mohan Charan Manjhi was contesting, the difference between voting percentage on polling day and the final percentage is 30.64 per cent.

This difference is the highest in the country -- perhaps the highest ever in the country's electoral history, the party said. 

Its leaders claimed that the discrepancy is high enough to affect the final outcome of the election and questioned how this could happen in an age of sophisticated EVMs and foolproof telecom network. 

"We filed an application with the Chief Election Officer of Odisha two months ago, asking them to provide us the Form 17 data. We have requested the Commission to clarify the discrepancies," said senior party leader Amar Patnaik.

"We are not questioning the EVM, we are questioning the Election process in which the EVM is a component," he added. 

Unlike the Congress, the party, he added, has not taken any call on the ballot box.  "The Election Commission has assured us that it would look into the matter and action will be taken if any discrepancies are found. The Commission, however, has not given any timeline for its response.