Chennai: Technical hitches that lead to the conking out of CCTV systems at some counting centres, where the polled Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) are stored in strong rooms, have become a bane to political workers keeping a watch at those venues as they are forced to raise an alarm immediately seeking .quick rectification of the faults and also guarding against any hanky panky.
Political parties, particularly the three main coalition leaders in the State, have invested a lot in manpower by engaging agents round the clock, to protect the strong rooms across the State where the polled EVMs are stored with four layers of security thrown around them round the clock and whenever a CCTV monitor goes blank somewhere, it raises concern.
DMK organization secretary R S Bharathi wrote to the Chief Election Commissioner in Delhi and the Chief Electoral Officer in Chennai that CCTV screens went blank from 6.20 pm to 6.40 pm on April 27 at the Government Polytechnic College in Ooty, where EVMs used for polling for the Nilgiris Lok Sabha seat are kept safe custody.
Similarly another incident was reported from the IRTT Government College of Engineering at Erode. Of the 220 CCTV cameras fixed at the venue, two conked out past Sunday midnight, forcing the agents of the contesting candidates to raise a hue and cry and draw the attention of the authorities. District collector Raja Gopal Sunkara had to intervene to set things right and pacify the party workers.
Bharathi, in his letter on Monday, pointed out that representatives of the candidates, keeping a vigil outside the strong rooms, did not have the permission to enter the inner perimeter and hence uninterrupted CCTV coverage of the strong rooms and permission to the political parties to view the monitor any time was the only way to keep a watch over the secured state of the strong room.
Referring to the system failing for 20 minutes at Ooty, he wanted the Election Commission authorities to ensure that there was no such interruption for whatever reason like technical or electrical or electronic happened in future and also requested that the area where the strong rooms were located as ‘no-fly zone for drones.’
He also said that the Chief agent of DMK candidate from Nilgiris, A Raja, had sought an explanation for the interruption and also the footage of CCTVs during the period when the screens went blank.
All over the State, agents of all parties are taking positions inside the premises where the strong rooms are located, which are mostly educational institutions that have been now turned into fortresses with Central and State armed police forces keeping vigil since the night of April 19 when the EVMs were locked there.
While the EVMs of the three Chennai constituencies are kept in the Anna University campus, Queen Mary’s College compound and Loyola college premises, there are other institutions in and around the State capital that house strong rooms for EVMs from adjoining Lok Sabha constituencies.
So the premises of Tiruvallur S N College of Engineering, Perumalpet Sriram College of Engineering, Sholinganallur Mohamed Sathak College, St Thomas Mount Montfort School, Tambaram Madras Christian College, Chengalpattu Pallava College of Engineering, Vidhya Sagar women’s College and Madurantakam Sowcar Girls Schools are out of bounds for outsiders but bustle with vigilant party workers of all hues working on shifts to guard the strong rooms and security personnel keeping a close watch.
