Imphal, May 19: Communist Party of India is going to launch an awareness campaign for electoral reforms in the state soon. Electronic Voting Machine is quite unreliable during the elections. It can be manipulated easily.
This was stated in a press conference at Irabot Bhawan by Dr Moirangthem Nara who also added that the recent 16th Lok Sabha polls were not conducted free and fairly in both the hills and valley areas of Manipur.
Pointing out that the election results has broken the hearts of people in the state as the Congress party manipulated the vote-counts, he said even the Election Commission of India is siding with the incumbent government and their assurances before the poll hasn’t materialised.
“Congress indulged in various malpractices during the election such as distributing money and using muscle power in the valley area. There are reports that Congress ministers distributed 50 thousand each in ten Masjids at a particular area of Lilong.”
“It is a question worth asking whether how honestly they will perform in Parliament if they have no qualms over indulging in corrupt practices at a holy place like Masjid,” he said.
He pointed out that the election agents of other parties were bought at Rs five thousand each for not causing disturbances while casting proxy votes, adding that even the officers on election duties were bribed to give good reports except some incidents at some places in Khundrakpam.
Lamenting that even after filing several complaints against such malpractices, no actions have been taken up by the ECI, he said complaints from Nagaland about conduct of re-polls were acted upon but the complaints raised by CPI was neglected.
Now, people demands head-to-head count of voters to know the majority because public hasn’t accepted the poll results, Nara observed.
In the hill areas, the real voter turnout was very less but the recorded turnout was 90 percent and above. It is unfortunate that in the 21st century era, people in Manipur could not exercise their franchise for electing the Parliament representative, he said.
Urging the public that they should be aware of such practices, he said a nationwide awareness campaign is necessary for electoral reforms in India and it will reach the state soon. The campaign started in 2008 with the objective of achieving its goal within 10 years.
LSA convenor Shanta, also a state secretariat member of CPI (M), said that the Left and Secular Alliance has conducted field reports on polling stations in some places in Khundrakpam with more than the 90 percent voter’s turnout adding that they found in some polling stations located in places habited mainly by Nepali community with more than 99% voting percentage, people couldn’t exercise their franchise and a village with only five families was recorded to be having a population of 150 in the electoral role.
