• Source:JND
Add as a preferred

Amid the complaints by the Congress to the Election Commission regarding the Haryana Assembly polls, the Grand Old Party on Sunday said that the reply by the poll body was nothing more than a generic set of bullets of how machines work rather than the specific clarification on the complaints. It also said that the response by the EC is generic and focused on diminishing the complainants and petitioners. 

The party further added that, not surprising, the EC has given a clean chit to itself and that its tone on the complaints regarding Haryana is condescending. Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh has also posted the response of party on his X handle.

"The Election Commission's reply is nothing more than generic set of bullet points on how machines work rather than specific clarification on our Haryana complaints ... While our complaints in Haryana were specific, the EC's response is generic and focused on diminishing complaints and petitioners," the party said in a letter addressed to the Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar.

 

“If the Prime Minister thinks of himself as God, his CEC will obviously think of himself as God’s gift to mankind,” jibed senior Congress leader Pawan Khera.

ALSO READ: Hyderabad's Air Quality Drops Significantly Post Diwali, Check Region-Wise AQI Data

The opposition party claimed that the EC's reply was written in a tone that is condescending and warned that if the poll panel persists with such language then it would have no choice but to seek legal recourse to expunge such remarks.

In its letter to the EC signed by nine senior Congress leaders, including general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh, the party said, "We have carefully studied your response to our complaints. Not surprisingly, the ECI has given a clean chit to itself. We would normally have let it be at that. However, the tone and tenor of the ECI's response, the language used, and the allegations made against the INC compel us to submit the counter-response."

"We do not know who is advising or guiding the hon'ble Commission, but it seems that the Commission has forgotten that it is a body set up under the Constitution and charged with the discharge of certain crucial functions - both administrative and quasijudicial," the response by the Congress leaders said.

The Congress letter said that if the Commission grants a recognised national party a hearing or examines issues raised by them in good faith it is not an 'exception' or 'indulgence' but it is the performance of a duty which it is required to do.
"If the Commission is refusing to grant us a hearing or refusing to engage on certain complaints (which it has done in the past) then the law allows recourse to the higher courts' extraordinary jurisdiction to compel the ECI to discharge this function (as happened in 2019)," the letter said.

ALSo READ: Swiggy IPO GMP Shows Negative Signs To Investors, Trends Downward Before Opening On November 6

The criticism by the Grand Old Party comes day after the poll body dismissed the party's claims of irregularities in the Haryana polls as baseless and frivolous. It had also emphasised that it has found no evidence to support the allegations made by the congress, particularly those concerning the display of a 99% battery status on Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) during vote counting.

(With input from agencies)