Visakhapatnam: The Election Commission declared former TD minister Ganta Sriniva-sa Rao elected from Visakhapatnam North even though the YSRC claimed that nearly 200 VVPAT slips were missing. District collector K. Bhaskar said the VVPAT slips issue had been resolved and Mr Rao received the certificate.
The YSRC has threatened to move court if the Election Commission failed to conduct re-polling at five centres, where the EVMs were not counted.
YSRC leader Botsa Satyanarayana, who won from Cheepurupalli, met Chief Electoral Officer Gopala Krishna Dwivedi on Friday to complain about the irregularities in counting of votes in Visakhapatnam North segment.
Vizag North YSRC candidate K.K. Raju had found that about 200 Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips were missing. He raised doubts over the alteration of EVMs to help Telugu Desam candidate Ganta Srinivasa Rao, who was subsequently declared elected.
He has complained that six EVMs were not counted due to technical issues. The officials resolved issues with two EVMs and decided to count VVPAT slips for the other four.
The YSRC leaders claim that the returning officer found only 107 VVPAT slips in the box out of 371 in one of the EVMs. They have alleged irregularities and asked the returning officer to ask for a re-poll.
Mr Raju alleged that there was a mismatch between the number of VVPAT slips and the votes polled in five booths. If the Election Commission fails to conduct a re-poll, he would move court, he said.
The YSRC has lost four Assembly seats in the city, including Visakhapatnam North. Its members urged Mr Dwivedi to conduct re-polling at all the centres where such discrepancies took place.
YSRC city president Vamsikrishna Srinivas demanded that the poll body conduct re-polling at the five polling centres, where EVMs could not be counted.
