Congress leader Anand Sharma said the poll panel has assured of calling an all-party meeting soon to discuss the concerns about the EVMs.
Stepping up clamour over alleged tampering of electronic voting machines (EVMs), a delegation of 13 political parties met the Election Commission on Monday and expressed their "complete loss of faith" in them.
The delegation demanded using VVPAT (voter verification paper trail) machines or paper ballots in all the upcoming polls. The delegation, comprising of Congress, Trinamool Congress, NCP, JD (U), RJD, BSP and Left parties, among others, are expected to meet President Pranab Mukherjee to press on the same issue.
"Going by what happened in the recent polls, be it the people or political parties, all have lost faith in EVMs. Therefore, the Election Commission should revert to using the old system of paper ballot instead of EVMs," senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad said after the meeting.
"Representatives of 13 parties put forth their views about the EVMs to the EC. We told them that free and fair polls cannot be ensured unless EVMs are taken out of use," he added.
Congress leader Anand Sharma said the poll panel has assured of calling an all-party meeting soon to discuss the concerns about the EVMs.
"The EC heard each political party patiently and the grievance was unanimous — lack of faith in EVMs. The EC assured that an all-party meeting will be convened soon and it will seriously examine our grievances," he said.
Earlier in the day, in a scathing attack, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal compared EC with Dhritarashtra whose only aim was to see son Duryodhan (read BJP) to emerge victorious in elections.
Kejriwal alleged that what was being dismissed as EVM malfunction was actually a case of tampering to ensure that the BJP gets the votes of even other parties. He alleged that in at least 18 EVM machines in Dholpur by polls the vote was going to the BJP no matter where it was pressed.
"It means that their software was changed, the code and programming was changed. When did they change all this?" said Kejriwal asking why the EC was not ready to investigate it.
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