Ensure paper trail in every booth, opposition to urge Election Commission

NEW DELHI: Opposition parties will demand VVPATs to be used in all polling booths across the country for the Lok Sabha elections and also that at least half of them be counted physically or tallied with the EVMs, it was learnt after leaders of 21 parties met on Friday.

Without disclosing the details, Congress president Rahul Gandhi said the parties will jointly approach the Election Commission on Monday. “On EVMs, we have put together a document that we will present to the EC on Monday and make some suggestions,” he said. “The main issue is that EVMs have created doubts in people’s minds about fair elections, so we want to talk about a back-up system to ensure free and fair elections,” Rahul added.

The opposition parties identified three big issues for the poll campaign. “All parties have agreed to discuss in detail three issues — two central and one structural — jobs, agriculture and attack on institutions. We are going to meet regularly and also talk to experts and find solutions to these problems,” Rahul said.

“The (general) elections will be about jobs, agriculture, attack on institutions, and corruption by the PM in the Rafale deal,” he added.

Asked about the budget being hailed as a “surgical strike”, Gandhi said, “Surgical strikes will happen on Mr Modi one after the other over the next two months on issues such as Rafale, jobs and demonetisation.”

TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu, NCP chief Sharad Pawar, National Conference leader Omar Abdullah, SP’s Ram Gopal Yadav, BSP’s Satish Chandra Mishra, DMK’s Kanimozhi, Derek O’Brien of Trinamool Congress, CPI’s D Raja, CPM’s Md Salim, Manoj Jha of Rashtriya Janata Dal, Aam Aadmi Party's Sanjay Singh and Rashtriya Lok Dal leader Jayant Chaudhary were among those who attended the meeting.