New Delhi: Markadwadi in Maharashtra’s Solapur will witness something that no constituency has probably seen before in India. On Tuesday, it will carry out repolling, though unofficially. But electronic voting machines (EVMs) won’t be in sight, it will be the ballot papers that voters will resort to. Most voters here are Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) supporters, and they are bent on challenging Election Commission’s data.
Markadwadi is located in the Malshiras assembly constituency in Solapur, where NCP (SP) candidate Uttamrao Jankar won, defeating BJP’s former MLA Ram Satpute. Despite Jankar’s victory, his MVA supporters from the village raised objections to the EVM counting results released by the Election Commission, which indicated the BJP candidate had a lead. As a result, a “re-poll” was called for.
Solapur SP issues notices
A day before the “re-polling”, the Solapur administration shot off notices to several villagers, asking them not to participate in the exercise as it could lead to tensions in the area. On Monday, police deployment was stepped up.
Solapur SP Atul Kulkarni was quoted as saying by Times of India that the notices were issued as a precautionary measure to prevent any untoward incidents. “The administration has been in talks with the villagers to persuade them to avoid any actions that could escalate into a law and order situation.”
One of the villagers said there are around 2,000 eligible electorate in the village. Of these, nearly 1,900 voted on Novemebr 20. He told TOI that the village has always backed Jankar and the Mohite Patil family. However, in this election, Jankar secured 843 votes while Satpute bagged 1,003 votes from th village. Most villagers suspect this EC data and polling on ballot papers has been organised “to get evidence of the distribution of votes”.
MVA supporters pointed out that they had crowdfunded the printing of ballot papers mentioning the names and photographs of all candidates who contested the Malshiras seat in the actual polls. They have put up banners asking villagers to “cast their vote” using these ballot papers.
They had urged the tehsildar to appoint government officials to watch over the process, but he refused. Vijay Pangarkar, the returning officer for the Malshiras seat, said that the voting and counting process was transparent. He ruled out any discrepancy in the data.
