KOCHI: A day after the District Collector recommended a re-poll at Kadungallur, the booth No:83 in Kalamassery under the Ernakulam Lok Sabha constituency, it has been revealed the mock votes which were left uncleared in the voting machine have resulted in the mismatch of votes.
The presiding officer had forgotten to delete the votes from the EVM after the mock poll. As a result, the final votes polled in the booth was shown as 758 after the completion of the election. However, as per the register, only 712 votes were cast in the booth. After noticing the mismatch, the Collector recommended a re-poll. The Chief Electoral Officer has already confirmed the report on re-poll and said he had already sent a report to the Election Commission.
The Election Commission is expected to announce a date for the re-polling at the booth soon. If the re-poll is conducted, the voters of the Booth No:83 will have to vote again. Kalamassery Assembly constituency has witnessed a poll per cent of 80.13 per cent. This figure will have a slight variation based on the re-polls. The CEO office also said an inquiry will be conducted into the matter after the re-poll. The major poll battle at Ernakulam was between LDF’s P Rajeev, UDF’s Hibi Eden and NDA’s Alphons Kannanthanam.