MP polls: Digvijaya Singh requests ECI to handover VVPAT slips to voters

Former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh Digvijaya Singh has once again hit the headlines ahead of state assembly polls after he requested Election Commission of India (ECI) to handover VVPAT (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail) slips to voters.

Singh wrote to ECI on X (formerly twitter) for the same on Monday citing a report of tampering with EVMs (Electronic Voting Machines) during trial of the machines in the state.

"Respected Election Commission, we have only one request, please hand over the VVPAT slip to us separately, which we will keep in a separate ballot box. Before counting, count the votes from any 10 ballot boxes and tally them with the results from the counting unit. If the result of both is same then declare the result from the results of the Counting Unit. What problem does the Election Commission have with this? We request the Supreme Court to take this matter seriously and save democracy in the country," Singh wrote on X.

The Congress leader also posted a YouTube link which showed that during the trial of EVM in Madhya Pradesh, the VVPAT slip of only one political party was received.

On the other hand, reacting to Singh's tweet, state secretary of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Rajneesh Agarwal slammed the Congress Party saying whenever Congress is losing badly in elections, they start blaming EVMs.

"Whenever Congress is losing badly in elections, it starts blaming EVMs. Even after the allegations were rejected going to the Supreme Court and ECI, Digvijaya Singh used to mislead the public and blame EVMs for the defeat of the Congress. There is no confidence left in Congress. Congress is already starting efforts to make such allegations," Agarwal said.

He further claimed that the BJP would register victory in the forthcoming assembly polls with over 150 out of 230 seats in the state.

Madhya Pradesh will go to the assembly polls on November 17 and the counting of votes will take place on December 3.