BHUBANESWAR: The BJD has called for conduct of a periodic ‘process audit’ of the entire election process by independent auditors or the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India to address the alleged discrepancies in the voting patterns observed during the 2024 General and Assembly elections in Odisha.
A delegation of BJD led by former Rajya Sabha member Amar Patnaik and all the seven party RS MPs submitted a memorandum to the Election Commission of India (ECI) emphasising that audits are prevalent in many democratic nations and would help ensure greater accountability in the election process. These audits, along with their findings, should be made publicly available, it added. The party has proposed the implementation of concurrent audits at polling booths and during the counting of votes. The declaration of results should only take place after the audit has been satisfactorily completed, ensuring that any discrepancies are addressed before final results are announced.
To further enhance transparency, the BJD has recommended developing a mechanism that involves citizen groups in co-monitoring the election process from its inception to conclusion. This would ensure greater public oversight and engagement, thus boosting confidence in the electoral system, it contended.
The party emphasised the need for all VVPAT slips to be tallied with the corresponding EVM counts at each booth. This should be done using advanced counting machines to further ensure that the voting process is accurate and transparent.
It has pointed out unexplainable variances in the vote counts, which is believed have been caused by errors in EVMs, human errors during data entry, or a combination of both. These discrepancies have given rise to doubts regarding the fairness and integrity of the elections, the memorandum stated.