Nothing incriminating found in viral video: CEO

Our Correspondent

Phagwara, May 22

While commenting upon video viral case, the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Punjab, S Karuna Raju, on Tuesday clarified that nothing went wrong or out of rules. He said that it was being reported that a man was roaming near Senior Secondary School Bhanoki village, near Phagwara, carrying EVMs on the polling day.

He said it was ascertained after investigation that the man was one Balwinder Kumar of Phagwara BDPO office who had been appointed in-charge of Sector 4 by the Returning Officer, Hoshiarpur. He had 9 polling stations under him.

Dr Raju said Balwinder Kumar had been provided with two complete sets of EVMs in a GPS-fitted car to exchange the machines in case of any discrepancy during the polling at any of these 9 booths. A videographer, Manish Kumar, was also present in the car carrying EVMs.

He said to allay all apprehensions of those present at the site were taken to the Despatch Centre at Guru Nanak College Sukhchainana Sahib and they were shown that on those machines it was clearly mentioned that those were reserved machines and had not been used at all.

Dr Raju said a similar case was reported in Jallandhar too, in which it had been allegedly that some people, with laptops, had entered the counting centre. In this case too it had been found that those persons were the members of the counting staff and had come to take part in training. Dr Raju urged people to not spread false information on the social media.