The Election Commission has ordered re-polling in six booths of the second phase of the Gujarat Assembly elections on Sunday, 17 December.
The re-polling, reportedly necessiated by technical reasons, was ordered late on 15 December after the EC annulled the polling data present in the EVMs.
Separately, the poll panel has ordered the counting of votes in 10 booths using Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) as the presiding officials forgot to wipe out the mock drill poll results from these Electronic Voting Machines (EVM).
Chief Electoral Officer of Gujarat BB Swain ordered re-polling in Chhaniyan-1 and Chhaniyan-2 polling stations of Vadgam constituency, booth no 27 of Viramgam constituency, Nava Naroda booth of Daskroi constituency and Nhara-1 and Sakarda-7 booths of Savli region.
Dalit leader Jignesh Mewani has contested from the Vadgam assembly seat.
Counting using the VVPAT slips will be for Ralisn-3 in Visnagar, Piludra-1 and Katosan-3 booths of Becharaji, Jamatha of Modasa, Vejalpur-58 of Vejalpur, Vastral-55 of Vatva, Khadiya-16 of Jamalpur-Khadiya, Pilol-2 of Savli, Gojpur and Songir booths of Sankheda constituencies.
The EC has clarified that the VVPAT counting will be in addition to the counting of the VVPAT slips prescribed by the Commission in which one booth per constituency was to counted using the paper trail method.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)