Arvind Kejriwal vs EC over ‘delay’ in final Delhi voter turnout

The “delay” in the release of the final voter turnout figures for Saturday's Delhi Assembly election kicked off a controversy with Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal terming the time taken by the Election Commission as “absolutely shocking”.

The Election Commission had announced on late Saturday night that the estimated turnout for the elections was 61.43%, hours after voting had closed at 6:00 p.m., but the final figures were announced Sunday evening.

“We are not late..the returning officers worked throughout the night to check data to ensure that it was accurate,” Delhi Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Ranbir Singh told a press conference here on Sunday evening, 25 hours after the end of voting on Saturday.

Singh said according to the final report 62.59% Delhi voters had exercised their franchise on Saturday.

Kejriwal-led AAP, projected as a clear winner by various exit polls on Saturday, grew anxious as there was no word from the Election Commission on the final turnout and raised questions on the alleged suspicious movement of Electronic Voting Machines in some assembly constituencies.

“Absolutely shocking. What is EC doing? Why are they not releasing poll turnout figures, several hours after polling,” Kejriwal tweeted, while his party leveled allegations of tampering of EVMs.

Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari's claims that the BJP was set to win 48 of the 70 seats, owing to a sharp increase in voting percentage in the final hours of polling added to the intrigue.

At the Sunday evening press conference, Delhi CEO Singh rejected AAP claims of EVM tampering and clarified that the video of the EVM being taken through narrow lanes was a reserve machine that was not used for polling.

Singh said the polling officials had to carry the EVM on foot for 500 meters as owing to narrow lanes near the polling station, the official car could not be taken there.

AAP also raised questions on the difference in the voting updates on the smartphone app of the Commission and the announcement made by the Delhi CEO of polling figures after every two hours on Saturday.

Singh said the Voter Turnout app received live data from only 11 assembly constituencies while updates for other seats had to be fed manually, leading to differences in the figures.

He said there were 13,780 polling stations in the national capital and they had to add data from each station and ensure that every vote is accounted for.