Huge turnout of voters seen at a polling station in Ongole on polling day (May 13, 2024).
| Photo Credit: KOMMURI SRINIVAS
Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud on Friday agreed to hear urgently at the end of the day an application filed by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms alleging inordinate delay in the publication of voter turnout data of the first two phases of polling in the Lok Sabha elections.
The NGO said that, besides delay in publishing the voter-turnout details, there was also a sharp spike in figures from the initial voter turnout percentages released by the Election Commission (EC), raising alarm bells in the public’s minds about the authenticity of the polling data available in the public domain.
The CJI agreed to hear the application at the end of the board of cases for the day and asked the EC counsel, advocate Amit Sharma, to take instructions.
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Chief Justice Chandrachud said the court too needed time to go through the application.
Mr. Bhushan said the application was mentioned on May 13 before a Bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna. The CJI had been abroad on an official trip. Justice Khanna had agreed to list the case on May 17 for hearing.
“I don’t know why it was listed in the mentioning list,” Mr. Bhushan told the CJI Bench.
The application has urged the court to direct the EC to disclose authenticated record of voter turnout by uploading on its website scanned legible copies of account of votes recorded at polling stations after each phase of voting in the on-going Lok Sabha elections. Rule 49S and Rule 56C (2) of the Conduct of Election Rules, 1961 require the presiding officer to prepare an account of votes recorded in form 17C (Part I) and the returning officer to record the number of votes in favour of each candidate.
Further, it has sought the publication of a constituency and polling station wise figures of voter turnout in absolute numbers and in percentage form.
The petition has also urged the court to direct the EC to disclose the candidate wise result of counting under after the compilation of results.
The petition said the voter turnout data for the first two phases of the Lok Sabha elections were published by the EC on April 30, after 11 days of the first phase of polling held on April 19 and four days after the second phase of polling held on April 26.
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The data published by the ECI in its April 30 press release showed a sharp increase (by about 5-6%) from the initial percentages announced by it on the polling day.
Initially, on April 19, after the first phase of polling, the EC had issued a press note stating that the tentative figure of voter turnout across 21 States/UTs reported was over 60% as of 7 pm. Similarly, after the second phase on April 26, the EC had said the turnout was at 60.96%.
“The inordinate delay in the release of final voter turnout data, coupled with the unusually high revision (of over 5%) in the EC press note of April 30 and the absence of disaggregated constituency and polling station figures in absolute numbers, has raised concerns and public suspicion regarding the correctness of the data… These apprehensions must be addressed and put to rest” the petition has said.
