Officials blame ‘new rules’ for delay in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan vote count
Rajasthan’s Chief Electoral Officer Anand Kumar said there will be some delay as votes in the electronic voting machine (EVM) have to be matched by randomly selecting a voter-verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) from a polling center in each assembly constituency.
Compared to the speedy counting of votes for the state assembly elections in Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Mizoram, counting in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan went on at a snail’s pace, keeping people in general and the political parties in particular on tenterhooks throughout the day.
Rajasthan’s Chief Electoral Officer Anand Kumar said there will be some delay as votes in the electronic voting machine (EVM) have to be matched by randomly selecting a voter-verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) from a polling center in each assembly constituency.
“This process will take some time and there will be some delay but we cannot tell how much delay will be there,” he added.
Kumar’s counterpart in Madhya Pradesh VL Kantharao said, “The delay is because every candidate has to be provided a certificate after every round of counting.”
The process that is being blamed for the delay in counting has already been done in the assembly elections of Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
The pace of counting can be gauged from the fact that till 5 pm counting at many centres had not been completed. The minimum number of rounds of counting was 15 and maximum 32. However, till 5 pm while come constituencies had finished 21 rounds of counting, others had completed 10 to 11 rounds only, as per official sources.
Notably, a Congress delegation, comprising MP Congress president Kamal Nath and state Congress campaign committee chairman Jyotiraditya Scindia had met the Chief Election Commissioner in Delhi recently to demand a certificate of votes polled after every round.
This process resulted in the delay in counting. Where there are more candidates it takes more time for the polling personnel to complete the counting and then provide the certificate to each of the candidates.
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