Aaditya Thackeray says BJP would have won 40 LS seats if there was paper ballot
Mumbai: A day after a call from Tesla CEO and X boss Elon Musk for the elimination of electronic voting machines (EVMs) over hacking concerns, Shiv Sena UBT leader Aaditya Thackeray also raised question marks over the use of votes recording devices saying the BJP would have won only 40 Lok Sabha seats and not 240 if polling was held using ballot papers and not EVMs.
“If the (Lok Sabha) election process was ‘free and fair’, the BJP would have won only 40 Lok Sabha seats and not 240,” said Thackeray on Monday before adding that the Election Commission is an ‘entirely compromised commission’.
His remarks came after Musk raised a concern over the security of EVMs. “We should eliminate electronic voting machines. The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high,” he wrote on X.
To buttress his claims, Thackeray referred to the controversial result of Mumbai North West constituency, which saw allegations of EVM hacking after the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena won the seat by mere 48 votes defeating the Shiv Sena (UBT). He demanded that the CCTV footage of the counting day should be released.
“The election result declared is suspicious. We have always had suspicions about this regime tampering with EVMs. Even Elon Musk has expressed his views, claiming everything can be hacked. Despite several requests, the Election Commission does not have the courage to release the CCTV footage of the counting day,” he said.
The Sena UBT leader said his party will seek legal recourse over the Mumbai North West Lok Sabha seat result, claiming victory was snatched from their candidate by ‘misuse’ of the official machinery. A petition regarding the ‘electoral malpractice’ will be filed in the court in a day or two, he said.
In the Mumbai North West Lok Sabha constituency, Shiv Sena (UBT) candidate Amol Kirtikar lost by 48 votes to rival Ravindra Waikar of the Shiv Sena led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.
The result has been mired in controversy after Mumbai police registered a case against Waikar’s brother-in-law for allegedly using a mobile phone at a counting centre on June 4, when results of the general elections were announced.
