Sharad Pawar in Markadwadi to test villagers' pulse on 'mock ballot paper poll'

Solapur (Maharashtra) (The Uttam Hindu): Nationalist Congress Party (SP) President Sharad Pawar on Sunday visited Markadwadi in Solapur and asked the authorities why the villagers were prevented from conducting a "mock ballot paper poll" on December 3. Pawar, 83, accompanied by senior party leader Vijaysinh Mohite-Patil and others was received by Malshiras' NCP (SP) winning MLA Uttamrao S. Jankar, local organisation activists and a large number of excited villagers of Markadwadi which has come under national focus for its anti-Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) drive.

After an interaction with the locals, Pawar will address a public rally in Markadwadi and express his support to their campaign for reverting to ballot paper voting. After the NCP (SP) top brass visit, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Shiv Sena (UBT) President Uddhav Thackeray and other INDIA-bloc allies are likely to visit Markadwadi in the coming weeks. Simultaneously, at least three Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) legislators have announced that they are ready to quit as MLAs and fight elections again provided the Election Commission of India (ECI) conducts it on ballot paper.

They are state Congress President Nana F. Patole from Sakoli (Bhandara), SS (UBT)'s Sunil Raut from Vikhroli (Mumbai) and NCP (SP)'s Uttamrao S. Jankar from Malshiras (Solapur). The trio of Patole-Raut-Jankar has claimed that if the ECI is prepared to hold polling on the ballot paper, they will resign as newly-elected legislators. "The ECI must consider this request. What is the harm in conducting the Assembly seat elections on ballot papers if it helps dispel doubts in public minds," demanded Jankar, as hundreds of villagers endorsed his stance.

Countering, the state Bharatiya Janata Party President Chandrashekhar Bawankule dared all the (46) MVA legislators to quit if they had doubts about the EVMs, while NCP (SP) Working President Supriya Sule has demanded that the upcoming civic polls should be conducted on ballot papers to clear peoples doubts. Other ruling Mahayuti allies Nationalist Congress Party's Deputy CM Ajit Pawar and Shiv Sena's Uday Samant termed it as the Opposition's drama as they have lost miserably in the Assembly polls and want to blame their failures on EVMs.