JOIN USCPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury said the Election Commission's rejection of the Opposition demand to first count the VVPAT slips went against the "spirit" of a Supreme Court order on the devices.
Yechury's reaction comes after the commission is learned to have stuck to its plan to count the voter-verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) slips in the end and not in the beginning as demanded by the Opposition.
"This goes against the spirit of the Supreme Court Order on VVPATs delivered before polling began," Yechury tweeted.
"If the process has been so long drawn for the sake of the integrity of the electoral process, why is (the) EC not adhering to the basic principle of testing the sample first?" the Left leader asked.
The Opposition had approached the EC on Tuesday and demanded that the five random VVPATs should be counted first so that if there is a problem or a mismatch, all such slips can be counted before it is too late.
"Integrity of EVMs by matching with sample VVPATs has to be done at the start of the counting," Yechury said.
"Doing so after the trends are declared makes it infructuous and is likely to lead to protests and a possible law and order situation from the affected candidates."