'Duly videographed': On TMC's claim, EC explains why EVMs in Bengal had 'BJP tags'

NEW DELHI: As eight seats of West Bengal votes on Saturday in phase 6 of Lok Sabha elections, Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress (TMC) levelled serious allegations against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claiming that five Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) at a polling station of Bankura's Raghunathpur had 'BJP tags' on them.

Sharing pictures of EVMs which had paper tags with BJP written on them, the TMC said on X, "Smt. @MamataOfficial has repeatedly flagged how @BJP4India was trying to rig votes by tampering with EVMs. And today, in Bankura's Raghunathpur, 5 EVMs were found with BJP tags on them."

Banerjee's party also tagged the Election Commission of India (ECI) and asked it to take corrective action. "@ECISVEEP should immediately look into it and take corrective action," the tweet said. The allegation comes amid the Opposition's claim of the central agencies being misused by the BJP-led central government.

The poll body, however, promptly replied to the claim and justified the tags. "While commissioning, common address tags were signed by the Candidates and their agents present. And since only BJP Candidate's representative was present during that time in the commissioning hall, his signature was taken during commissioning of that EVM and VVPAT," the poll body replied on the social media platform.

The ECI further stated that it was "done entirely under CCTV coverage".

"However, signature of all the agents present in PS No 56,58, 60, 61,62 was obtained during Poll. All the ECI norms were duly followed during commissioning was done entirely under CCTV coverage and was duly videographed," it said.

Eight Lok Sabha seats of Bengal — Tamluk, Kanthi, Ghatal, Jhargram, Medinipur, Purulia, Bankura, and Bishnupur — are voting today in phase 6. In 2019, the BJP had won five and TMC had secured win on three seats.

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