The DMK submitted a plea to the Election Commission of India (EC) on Monday, seeking a direction to ensure uninterrupted CCTV coverage in all ‘strong rooms’, where the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) have been stored, after the polling on April 19.
The party also sought for a direction from the EC for declaring the places, where the EVMs have been kept in ‘strong rooms’, as ‘drones no-fly zone’. DMK Rajya Sabha MP N.R. Elango handed over his party’s representation to Chief Electoral Officer Satyabrata Sahoo, at the Secretariat campus in Chennai, on Monday.
The representation by DMK’s organisation secretary, R.S. Bharathi, followed an incident in the Nilgiris Parliamentary constituency, where the CCTV surveillance of the ‘strong room’ was interrupted for a few minutes on April 27. This incident, the DMK contended was an instance where a “reasonable apprehension” could be drawn, regarding the safety and security of the ‘strong rooms.’
“The only way to monitor the secured state of the strong room is the uninterrupted CCTV coverage of the facility and the permission to the political parties to view the monitor of the CCTV at any point of time. A back-up of the recorded video also to be preserved from the time the strong rooms were sealed till they are opened on the counting day,” the DMK said.
