New CEC willing to address concerns over booth-wise voter turnout data: EC tells SC

Having opposed the demand for uploading polling booth-wise voter turnout data on its website last year, the Election Commission on Tuesday told the Supreme Court that the new Chief Election Commissioner was willing to discuss the issue.

A three-judge Bench led by Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna asked petitioners Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and TMC MP Mahua Moitra to make representations to the Election Commission in 10 days.

The direction came after senior advocate Maninder Singh submitted, on behalf of the poll panel, that Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar wanted to meet the petitioners and discuss their grievances.

"The new Chief Election Commissioner has asked me to inform Lordships that they (petitioners) can meet him and whatever is possible they are open and willing to do whatever…" Singh told the Bench.

“The counsel for the EC states that the petitioners may file a representation with the EC and it will give them a hearing and inform them about the same in advance. Let the representation be made in 10 days," the CJI said, deferring the hearing to the week commencing July 28.

On behalf of the petitioners, senior counsel AM Singhvi and advocate Prashant Bhushan contended that publication of polling turnout data under Form-17C was a part of citizens’ right to know.

The petitioners have sought a direction to the EC to upload polling station-wise voter turnout data on its website within 48 hours of conclusion of polling in the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.

On May 10 last year, the ADR had filed an interim application in its 2019 PIL seeking directions to the poll panel that "scanned legible copies of Form 17C Part-I (account of votes recorded)" of all polling stations be uploaded immediately after the polls.

However, in an affidavit filed in the top court, the EC had on May 22, 2024 said, “There is no legal mandate to provide Form-17 to any person other than the candidate or his agent. The petitioner is trying to create an entitlement when none exists in the law by way of filing an application in the middle of the election period.”

The EC had opposed the demand contending it would "vitiate" the electoral space and cause "chaos" in the poll machinery in the midst of the general elections. Lamenting that continuous attempts were being made to create doubts about the electoral process, the poll panel had urged the Supreme Court to dismiss the ADR’s plea seeking voter turnout data under Form 17C, saying “such attempts de-motivate voters.”

Responding to ADR’s plea seeking a direction to it to upload polling station-wise voter turnout data on its website within 48 hours of conclusion of polling for each phase of the Lok Sabha elections, the poll panel asserted that “There is neither delay nor difference in percentage of voter turnout data, more than what is inbuilt into the process, scale and magnitude in play.”

The poll panel maintained that voter turnout disclosures are made through statutory i.e. Form-17 furnished to candidates or his agents and non-statutory methods such as its voter turnout app, website and press releases which are continuously updated at an interval of two hours on polling day – the last being at 11.45 hours after waiting for the maximum number of parties to return.

It said, “Next day scrutiny of polling station level records is conducted before candidates. Voter turnout app continuously keeps reflecting data on live basis. On the other hand, Form 17-C is given to agents of candidates after the close of poll on voting day itself as per the statutory requirement and the information in Form 17-C gets set in stone...Petition was based on “baseless suspicion” and the petitioner had not approached the court with clean hands, it submitted.

Inordinate delay in the release of final voter turnout data, coupled with the unusually high revision of over 5 per cent in the poll panel’s press note of April 30, 2024, has raised concerns and public suspicion regarding the correctness of the said data, the ADR said in its interim application filed in its 2019 PIL that sought directions to EC to immediately upload after polling “scanned legible copies of Form 17C Part-I” of all polling stations.

The NGO said it wanted to ensure that the democratic process was not subverted by electoral irregularities.

“The voter turnout data for the first two phases of the ongoing 2024 Lok Sabha elections published by ECI on April 30 has been published after 11 days of the first phase of polling held on April 19 and 4 days after the second phase of polling was held on April 26. The data as published by the ECI in its press release dated April 30, 2024, shows a sharp increase (by about 5-6 per cent) as compared to the initial percentages announced by ECI as of 7 pm on the day of polling,” it had alleged.