Jaganmohan Reddy, whose party suffered crushing defeat in the recent simultaneous Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, seems to be unable to digest people’s decisive verdict. Earlier, he blamed the voters for not voting him after getting benefit of his `direct cash transfer’ schemes. Now, he is blaming EVMs.
Joining the debate following tech billionaire Elon Musk’s call to eliminate EVMs, he called for using ballot papers.Jagan, who boasts that if he wins, it is because of him, is trying to push the pretense of defeat once towards the voters and this time on the EVMs.
Jagan, who spoke to the media on the same day of counting of votes about the defeat in the election, tried to pretend that the people did not believe him and that he had cheated them by taking schemes. But on Tuesday, he demanded paper ballot voting. In a post in X he said:
“The shift towards paper ballots, as observed in many advanced democracies, is a step in the right direction. It enhances transparency, ensures verifiability, and bolsters public confidence in the electoral outcomes. By adopting paper ballots, we can better uphold the true spirit of our democracy and strengthen the trust of our citizens in the democratic process. We demand paper ballot voting”
In a strong counter to former Jagan’s call for using ballot papers, the TDP and its ally Jana Sena reminded him of his statement defending EVMs, when his party had won 151 Assembly seats in 2019. Senior TDP leader Somireddy Chandra Mohan Reddy said that Jaganmohan Reddy has not recovered from the shock. “Jagan is talking like Andhra Pradesh Elon Musk,” taunted the TDP leader in a post on X.
The former Ministers said the YSRCP leader should recall what he had said after winning the 2019 elections. The video was also shared by Jana Sena from its official X handle. In the video, Jaganmohan Reddy was heard defending the functioning of EVMs.
Jagan commented that EVMs during the general elections in 2019 were completely different. He said: “80 percent of the voters pressed the button in the polling booth. Whom they voted for also appeared in the VV PAT. All those who voted were satisfied because both were matched. 80 percent of the voters did not give a complaint. 80 percent of the population was satisfied because it did not appear. Nothing happened anywhere.”
