By Rakesh Nevase/Indie Journal
Mumbai, December 2: Following the chaos and debate over the Maharashtra Assembly election results, a village in Maharashtra’s Solapur district has organised a dummy poll on ballot paper on December 3.
The villagers of Markadwadi in Malshiras State assembly constituency have questioned the poll results in their constituency, claiming that they do not trust the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs). The local administration has however called this illegal and deployed police to stop it.
The recently concluded Maharashtra Assembly polls gave a landslide victory to the Mahayuti alliance, comprising the BJP, Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). The result was surprising for many analysts.
The Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) has launched a statewide movement against EVMs asking for the return of ballot papers.
However, a village named Markadwadi in Malshiras assembly constituency in Solapur district has gone a step ahead and decided to conduct their own dummy election.
Uttam Jankar of Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar) won the Malshiras assembly constituency this time. But during counting, it was revealed that BJP candidate Ram Satpute got more votes in this village. Out of 1,864 votes polled in this village, Satpute got 1,003, while Jankar received only 843 votes.
These numbers have taken villagers by surprise as they said that Jankar would always get the lead in Markadwadi. Ranjit Markad, the son of Markadwadi Sarpanch, said while speaking to the media, that the whole village rejects the result given by the EVM machine.
“We villagers have decided to hold polls again, this time on ballot papers. We do not trust machines anymore. Out of around 1,900 votes polled, we were expecting just about 300 to 400 to go to the opposition. But instead, 1,000 votes went to the opposition,” says Markad, suggesting his village is a stronghold of Jankar and NCP(SP).
The other villagers with him said that they have been voting for Jankar for the last three to four elections.
Uttam Jankar was part of NCP’s Ajit Pawar faction but jumped ship at the time of Lok Sabha elections as NCP(SP) candidate Dhairyasheel Mohite-Patil was trying to attract local leaders. This is his third term as MLA from the assembly.
This dummy election comes after many in Maharashtra, including candidates who lost and many analysts who predicted a victory for MVA, have questioned the reliability of EVMs. Maharashtra Congress President Nana Patole has said congress will fight legal and road battles against EVMs.
NCP(SP) supremo Sharad Pawar, while speaking in Pune, also showed scepticism over the results and the sudden increase of voting percentage in the last hour on the polling day. There have been frequent demands by different political activists, leaders and commentators to do away with EVM and have elections on ballot papers.
Showing the same disbelief in the results, the villagers have passed a resolution in the gram panchayat and have submitted it to the Tehsildar. The resolution demands a dummy election so they can determine if Satpute really secured 1000+ votes in their village. They are willing to spend their own money for this.
They have printed their own ballot papers, set up an election booth and gone door to door, telling voters to vote for the same candidate they voted for on November 20. All they need are trained Government employees to conduct dummy polls. Villagers have demanded this in their resolution.
The local administration, however, rejected the call for revote with ballot papers. Administration has also deployed police to make sure that there is no voting on December 3. Police have issued notices to 20 villagers and told them conducting any such election is illegal. While opposition groups have rejected calls for revote and boycotted the voting, many of the villagers want to see what really went wrong.
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