Uttarakhand High Court orders sealing of EVMs for six assembly constituencies within 48 hours

In a major decision amid the EVM tampering row, the Uttarakhand High Court on Monday ordered the sealing of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) in six assembly constituencies within 48 hours.

The six constituencies where the Uttarakhand High Court has ordered sealing of EVMs are Mussoorie, Rajpur, Raipur, Ranipur, Haridwar Rural and Pratappur.

The order was passed by Justice Sarvesh Kumar Gupta while hearing the petition filed in context of its tampering. The court has given six-weeks-time to all the concerned parties to respond.

On April 27, the Uttarakhand High Court had issued notices to the Central Election Commission (EC), the State Election Commission and Bharatiya Janata Party Vikasnagar MLA MS Chauhan.

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The action was taken on a plea filed by Congress’ Vikasnagar runner-up candidate Navprabhat on alleged tampering of EVMs. The court had asked the authorities to preserve the EVMs, seeking a response within six weeks.

Chauhan had defeated the Congress candidate, Navprabhat in the elections held in February this year. Former Uttarakhand chief minister Harish Rawat had alleged possible tampering of EVMs.

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EVMs will now be kept with an additional judicial custody seal of judicial magistrate:BP Nautiyal, petitioner's lawyer in EVM tampering case pic.twitter.com/0GAFhwtO2T

— ANI (@ANI_news) May 1, 2017