A citizens group announced a nationwide protest against EVMs on May 30. Besides Mumbai and Delhi, protests against EVMs are reportedly being held at Sardarbag in Ahmedabad, Shubhash Fourway in Allahabad, Azad Maida in Panjim and Lohia Maidan in Margao, Goa, and more.
Mumbai: A citizens group announced a nationwide protest against EVMs on May 30. Besides Azad Maidan in Mumbai and Jantar Mantar in Delhi, protests against EVMs are reportedly being held at Sardarbag in Ahmedabad, Subhash Fourway in Allahabad, Azad Maida in Panjim and Lohia Maidan in Margao, Goa, and more.
“The outcome of the recent Parliamentary elections has shocked the entire nation. We always believed that EVMs are hacked on a massive scale by the BJP and our belief is strongly substantiated by numbers now. The website of the Election Commission (EC) shows that the “votes counted” do not match with “votes polled”, in all the 48 constituencies in Maharashtra. It did not match in 203 assembly constituencies of Madhya Pradesh also. This is enough to prove that EVMs were manipulated and it is therefore very clear that the results cannot be believed in,” the citizen’s collective said.
“Many people from across the country are posting on social media, on the discrepancies in the votes in their constituencies. We have all witnessed the malfunctioning of EVMs and looked on bewildered at the suspicious movements of thousands of EVMs, which were even found in hotel rooms,” their letter said.
“Right from the first phase of polling, almost the entire media was reporting that the NDA is going to suffer a minimum loss of 140 seats. More than 50% population that is dependent on agriculture was extremely disappointed and angry with the Modi Govt due to the worsening agrarian crisis and rising rate of suicides. The issues of Demonetization which itself was the biggest organised scam ever, the extremely anarchic implementation of the GST, rising unemployment, the Rafale scam among many other issues, were supposed to be the key issues against the government. Where did it all the anger and discontent disappear?” they asked.
“Moreover why is there a complete “Sannata”, a “Silence” across the country, even after Modi returned to power by securing over 45% votes for the NDA??? Why aren’t the citizens jubiliant?? This shows that the people are stunned and in a state of utter disbelief. They too did not expect a victory for BJP – and that is why we call it the “EVM Sarkar”,” they said.
“We have all seen the biased approach of the Election Commission during the entire two-month long campaign. We are all aware that like all the of other instutions of our parliamentary democracy, the EC too has been subverted by Modi,” they said.
“Also very interestingly when the EC was asked to go ahead with the Ballot Papers, the excuse they gave was very weak and beyond ridiculous. The EC had given an extremely absurd reason on 19th January 2019. The EC stated, “We do not have sufficient time to go for the paper ballot”. For 60 years, the EC used to print ballot papers AFTER the scrutiny and withdrawal of nomination forms. The election was supposed to be held in April and May, but the EC said it did not have time to opt for ballot papers. Truly unbelievable, even by the low standards of the current EC,” they wrote.
“Amit Shah boasts of making BJP the biggest political party in the world with a membership of over 7 Crore active members. He talks about having 25 youth per booth and an incharge for every page of the voter list. But then, why is the biggest political party in the world scared of conducting elections by Ballot Paper?? The only answer is that BJP is capable of the mass manipulation of the EVMs, but not the masses. They know that they cannot win an election conducted under transparent, free and fair conditions,” they said.
“We thus Go to the Peoples Court! Thus, we have decided to go to the people. We will protest against this massive EVM hacking. We are sure that people will join the movement to end the use of EVMs in our electoral system and call for a return to the Paper Ballot System. It must also be emphatically stated that the overwhelming majority of the democratic nations of the world use Ballot Paper and have discarded the EVMs. Infact the EVMs pose a clear danger to our entire Electoral Parliamentary Constitutional Democracy and thus must be immediately discarded and done away with,” they said.
“Let the people come out and voice their opinion, anger, opposition, express their disbelief and a vote of no-confidence in the EVMs. The Supreme Court should find its spine and set aside these elections. Let there be free and fair elections by paper ballot and then only will the people reaffirm their faith in our democracy. We have thus called for a national day of protest on the 30th of May and appeal to all the citizens, social movements and political parties to come out and organise protests in all the cities, towns and villages across the country. EVM HATAO – DESH BACHAO! SAVE OUR DEMOCRACY – SAVE INDIA!” they said.
The letter was signed by Retd. Justice Kolse Patil, Dr. Suresh Khairnar, Niranjan Takle, Shabnam Hashmi, Ravi Bhilane, Feroze Mithiborwala, Pratibha Shinde, Kishor Jagtap, Jyoti Badekar, Salim Alware, Dhananjay Shinde, Adv. Niranjani Shetty, Com. Charul Joshi, Prof. Kunda Pramila, Dhammarakshit Randive, Prabha Pandey, Santosh Gawli, Sancia Sequeira, Kranti, Rina Kamath, Shambuk, Aamir Qazi, Kashinath Nikhalje, Yashodhan Paranjpe, Swati Kunchikore, Afaque Azad and Siddharth Pratibhavant.