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Chandigarh mayoral poll fiasco: AAP releases 3 damning clips of ‘ballot tampering’ by Masih
This comes a day after the SC took a strong note of the alleged defacing of ballots by the presiding officer
A day after the Supreme Court of India made scathing remarks over presiding officer Anil Masih’s conduct during the Chandigarh mayoral elections, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Tuesday released three videos, purportedly showing Masih tampering with the ballot papers and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) councillors directing camerapersons to pan away, allegedly in a bid to aid him.
The entire election process was recorded on seven cameras.
On Monday, a three-judge bench presided by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud had termed Masih’s actions -- wherein he is seen looking at the cameras and then seemingly defacing the ballots – a murder of the democracy.
In one of the three videos released by the AAP on Tuesday, Masih is purportedly seen making some pen marks on the right side of eight ballot papers. Pertinent to mention here that eight votes had been declared invalid during the counting.
In the 35-member MC House, the AAP and the Congress which had come together as part of the INDIA bloc, was sure of a win as it had a combined strength of 20 councillors. The BJP, meanwhile, had 14 councillors and one vote of the Chandigarh MP, who is the ex-officio member of the House. The sole Shiromani Akali Dal councillor in House had demanded the none-of-the-above (NOTA) option, however, his request was declined.
When the results were declared, 16 votes had been polled in BJP’s favour, the INDIA bloc candidate got 12 votes while eight votes had been declared invalid.
Another video clip, allegedly shot before the supposed tampering was done, shows Masih going through all the ballot papers.
In a third clip, which is around 2.25 seconds long, some BJP councillors are ostensibly seen objecting to camerapersons focusing on Masih during the counting of votes. They are also purportedly seen waving to the camerapersons to shift the focus elsewhere.
AAP’s co-incharge SS Ahluwalia, who released the videos to the media, said, “The three clips were the ones shown to the Supreme Court bench on Monday.”
“These clips are part of the two-hour footage obtained from the MC by the AAP and Congress candidates,” said Ferry Sofat, one of the lawyers of the AAP mayoral candidate in Supreme Court.
Another clip, that had flooded the social media on January 30, right after declaration of results, had been shot by some journalists sitting in the media room. In the said video, it was not clear as to where the alleged markings were made by Masih but the latest video, from cameras placed diagonally above the presiding officer’s seat, clearly show him tampering with the ballot papers,
AAP leaders said.
‘There were marks on ballot
papers even before voting’
Ahluwalia alleged there were some marks on the ballot papers even before voting started. “Our councillors had spotted some marks on the ballot papers right after they received it. Thus, 11 ballot papers were replaced before polling. As this nefarious plan of the BJP failed, they decided to tamper with the ballot papers during counting.”
“It is clearly visible in the first video that 20 votes went to the joint candidate of AAP and Congress, Kuldeep Kumar, and 16 votes went to BJP. Presiding officer Anil Masih deliberately made tick marks and dots on eight ballot papers that were polled in favour of the INDIA bloc candidate. His entire crime is now in front of the people,” he alleged.
“In the other clip, BJP councillors including—Kanwarjit Rana, Harjit Singh, Kuljeet Sandhu, Jasmanpreet Singh, former mayor Anup Gupta, and nominated councillors—Satinder Singh Sidhu, Amit Jindal, Dr Ramneek Bedi, Dr Naresh Panchal—are seen telling the camerapersons to shift focus from Anil Masih so that the process of tempering is not recored,” Ahluwalia added.
BJP leaders remained unavailable for comments even as several attempts were made to reach them.
Meanwhile, AAP councillors continued their hunger strike for the third consecutive day on Tuesday and demanded police action against Masih. “People are demanding that the mayor who was forcefully appointed by the BJP be removed. Despite our complaint, police are not registering the FIR against Masih,” said councillors.
