Election Commission takes exception to Congress leaders' remarks about Haryana results, to meet party delegation

The Congress delegation will include party general secretary KC Venugopal, former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, former Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and Leader of Opposition in Punjab assembly Pratap Singh Bajwa.

The delegation will also include Pawan Khera, chairman, media and publicity department, party treasurer Ajay Maken and Haryana Congress chief Uday Bhan.

Congress had sought time from Election Commission to express its concern over counting process in some constituencies.

In its letter to Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, the Election Commission referred to remarks of Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh and Pawan Khera, saying their comments that "results are not acceptable" had been reported in the media.

"Such an unprecedented statement as above in a generic sense, unheard in the rich democratic heritage of the country, is far from a legitimate part of free speech and expression and moves towards an undemocratic rejection of the will of the people expressed in accordance with the Statutory and Regulatory electoral framework, uniformly applied across all elections in the country including J-K and Haryana," the poll panel said in its letter.

The EC said it has noted statements from Kharge and Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi which have termed the Haryana results as "unexpected" and that the Congress proposes to analyse the same and approach the ECI with its complaints and grievances.

The poll panel said it has received request for a meeting by a 12-member Congress delegation including those who had made remarks about not accepting the Haryana results.

"Proceeding on a fair assumption that the statement of the party president is the formal party position on the electoral outcome, the ECI has agreed to meet the delegation today at 6 pm," the letter said.

The Congress on Tuesday rejected Haryana assembly results saying the outcome is "totally unexpected, completely surprising, counter-intuitive and against ground-reality and that "it is not possible" for the party "to accept the results".

Addressing a press conference on the results in Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir, Jairam Ramesh and Pawan Khera said they have received "very serious complaints" on the process of counting and they will move the Election Commission.

The Congress won 37 seats with BJP 48 seats in the 90-member Haryana assembly. BJP is poised to form its third successive government in the state.

Jairam Ramesh said "what we have seen in Haryana is a victory for manipulation, a victory for subverting the will of the people and it is a defeat for transparent democratic processes"

"The results in Haryana are totally unexpected, completely surprising and counter-intuitive. It goes against ground reality. It goes against what the people of Haryana had made their minds up for, which was for change and transformation. I think under these circumstances, it is not possible for us to accept the results that have been announced today," he said. .

"We have received very serious complaints on the process of counting, the functioning of EVMs in at least three districts. There are more that are coming in. We have spoken to our senior colleagues in Haryana and this information is being collected. We hope to present this in a consolidated form to the Election Commission tomorrow or the day after. We will seek time...Serious questions have been raised by our candidates. We will bring it to the notice of the Election Commission," he added.

Pawan Khera said they are surprised and no one can believe that "such an unexpected result" will come in Haryana. He said the party cannot accept such an outcome.

"If it is said in one line, this is the victory of the system and the defeat of democracy. We cannot accept this...We are collecting complaints. Our candidates have given complaints to the returning officers there and are still giving them. In the coming days, we will soon go to the Election Commission with all these complaints and register our complaint there. This kind of result was not visible anywhere on the ground. No one can believe that such an unexpected result will come in Haryana. We are all surprised," Khera said.

Even as the trends showed that BJP was ahead by a margin of 15 seats in Haryana, Congress leaders insisted that the party will see a surge in the last rounds of counting. They claimed that the Election Commission was not updating its website on realtime basis. The poll panel rejected Congress concerns and said there is nothing on record to substantiate the "ill-founded allegation of the slowdown in updating of results." (ANI)