Moily, a former Union Law Minister, said it was the Congress that had introduced the electronic voting machines and should be proud of the reforms that have taken place in the Election Commission over the years. PTI file photo
Differences in the Congress on junking electronic voting machines for paper ballots came to the fore when senior leader M Veerappa Moily and Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh broke ranks to fully support the electoral system in the country.
However, the party chose to ignore the senior leaders' remarks and brought together opposition parties to take the EVM tampering and other issuse to President Pranab Mukherjee.
Moily, a former Union Law Minister, said it was the Congress that had introduced the electronic voting machines and should be proud of the reforms that have taken place in the Election Commission over the years.
“Among all countries, our electoral system is the best and for that the credit should go to the UPA and Congress. We can have a committee to look into issues of EVMs but there is no question of going back to manual methods,” he said here.
“If EVMs were fixed then I wouldn't be sitting here. The Akalis would be,” NDTV quoted the recently-elected Punjab Chief Minister as saying.
Moily stood by his remarks that the blaming the EVMs for electoral losses was “defeatist”. However, he nuanced it by saying that the “Congress never tampered EVMs”.
The Congress was not amused by Moily's stand and curtly dubbed it as his personal opinion. It came on a day when Congress led a delegation of opposition leaders to President Mukherjee to flag their concerns on alleged tampering of EVMs and other issues.
“If somebody has said something. It is his personal opinion. Let it be very clear on this, it is his personal opinion and not that of the Congress,” senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad told reporters.
Azad also made it clear that Moily was consulted while drafting the memorandum that the opposition leaders submitted to the President. “He read the draft twice and then put his signature to it. He also was part of the delegation,” Azad said.
After the defeat in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, BJP leader L K Advani too had blamed the EVMs for the loss of the party at the hustings. Back then, the Congress had then dubbed Advani's statement as “astonishing” and a “stretch of imagination”.