MARGAO
A group, including senior citizens and the Shadow Council for Margao, have demanded an inquiry to ascertain the causes that led to the rejection/invalidation of nearly 2,500 votes cast via postal and absentee ballots.
At a media briefing, addressed along with President of the Federation of All Goa Senior Citizens Diago D'costa and Secretary-General of the federation Adv Nicholas Colaco, SCM convenor Savio Coutinho informed that a complaint has been filed in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer Kunal (IAS) demanding verification by checking all the postal ballots and absentee ballots along with the respective envelopes/declarations to ascertain the facts over the matter.
In the complaint, Coutinho stated that around 2,500 votes have been rejected or considered invalid, and demanded an inquiry into the cause that led to the rejection of a large number of votes cast during the general assembly elections. These votes have been cast via postal ballots, by the government officials on polling duty, and senior citizens and handicapped voters, who were not able to go to polling stations, he said.
Coutinho added that several of the ballots were either rejected or considered invalid as the number on the ballot envelope and the ballot paper number on the declaration mismatched, and were different.
"As a counting agent myself, it was much to the surprise of all of us in the counting hall that a huge number of votes of both the above-mentioned categories were either rejected or held invalid. When the counting staff and RO were questioned over the reasons for considering the ballots invalid, they said the ballot paper numbers written on the ballot envelope and the accompanying declaration was different or didn't match”, he added.
Questioning the ECI as to how this mismatch occurred, and who was responsible for this mismatch, he said since the voters of this category were only supposed to tik-mark their choice of candidate, every other detail on the envelopes and the declarations were the responsibility of the concerned officials.
Senior Citizens Federation President Diago D'costa demanded to know why a genuine vote of a duty-bound citizen went unaccounted because of the errors of the polling officials.
Apprehensions were expressed at the press briefing whether it was the case that all the ballots were marked by an individual and subsequently jumbled up the papers while sealing them in the bigger envelopes.
"We are compelled to imagine this situation considering that it was not just one or two but a huge number of nearly 2,500 mismatched ballots", Adv Nicholas Colaco said.
