Residents of Kolewadi village in Maharashtra’s Satara district have passed a resolution to conduct future elections using ballot papers, making it the second village in the state to take a stand against Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), reports PTI.
The village, which falls under the Karad (South) assembly constituency, recently passed the resolution after some residents expressed concerns over the credibility of votes cast via EVMs. The constituency was previously represented by senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, who lost to BJP candidate Atul Bhosale by over 39,000 votes in the November elections.
Shankarrao Patil, husband of the village’s sarpanch (village head), Ratnamala Patil, said that the resolution was passed on December 2 during a gram sabha (village assembly) meeting. Patil said the decision was made in response to villagers’ demands to hold future elections with ballot papers instead of EVMs.
“Villagers were surprised that Prithviraj Chavan did not secure the expected number of votes in Kolewadi during the assembly elections,” Patil added.
The move follows days after a group of villagers tried to conduct mock “re-polling” with ballot papers to protest the use of EVMs in the Markadwadi village in Solapur’s Malshiras constituency. However, their efforts were blocked by local authorities, and cases were registered.
One villager from Kolewadi told PTI, “We have resolved that the people of Kolewadi will vote only if the process is conducted using ballot papers. We won’t vote if EVMs are used in future elections.” He added that if the administration does not allow voting with ballot papers, the village would boycott the polling process.
Satara district collector Jitendra Dudi said his office had not yet received a copy of the resolution and could not comment until it did.
“Once we receive the copy, we will take the required measures,” Dudi said.