Election Commission's stand sought on vote plea

Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court asked the Election Commission’s opinion seeking counting of all Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips polled in Ibrahim-patnam constituency during the Assembly election, to nullify potential errors in EVMs. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Thottathil B. Radhakrishnan and Justice A. Rajasheker Reddy was hearing a petition of BSP candidate Malreddy Ranga Reddy who lost to the TRS’ Manchireddy Kishan Reddy by 376 votes. He said there was a discrepancy between the EVM display and the VVPAT count.

The bench asked EC counsel to inform its stand by January 30. Mr Rakesh Munjal, senior counsel of the Supreme Court, said further delayed might cause the vanishing of images on the VVPAT slips as these were printed with thermal technology. He said that election officials had opened some VVPATs during which it was observed that there was a difference in the number of votes on the EVM display and the VVPAT trail.