By Rajan Narayan

THE Supreme Court may have given a clean chit to the electronic voting machine. The SC has not even accepted the demand that the VP trail should be 100%. This is a paper trail left behind to show how the voter casts his vote. There are major flaws in the working of the EVM machines. When a voter enters the polling booth, the electoral officer is supposed to activate the EVM machine. The voter will hear a ring to assure him that the EVM machine is switched on. Only when the EVM machine is switched on it will load the software comprising the names and the symbols of candidates.
In the second phase of the election, it was found in Kerala that the electoral officer did not activate the EVM machine. Several hundred voters pressed the button in the voting compartment without registering their vote. This was because the EVM machine had not been switched on. Since you have to guard your vote make sure the EVM machine is switched on when you are ready to vote.
The karyakarta or party workers should educate the semi-literate and the illiterate voters about the ringtone which signals the EVM machine is working. Even the educated voters are not aware that an electoral official can deny you your right to vote. It has also been suggested by election activists that there should be control over the software loaded on to the EVMs. The names and symbols of the various candidates are part of the software which is loaded on to the EVM machines in each constituency. This is because the number of candidates and a number of parties can change from constituency to constituency.
In South Goa for instance there are at least three important candidates. Besides Captain Viriato Fernandes of Congress and Pallavi Dempo of BJP, Manoj Porab of the Goa Revolutionary Party is also contesting the election. So the EVM has to be loaded with the names and symbols of the candidates who have filed the nomination. To be correct the names and symbols of the candidates in each constituency must be loaded only after the last date for withdrawal.

ELECTORAL PROCESS
MANY of us seem to have lost sight of the elaborate electoral process. Dates are fixed for filing of nomination. If the nominations are filed the candidates are required to declare criminal records if any. They are also required to declare their assets and liabilities. The candidate also has to produce the certificate that they have paid their income tax, electricity bills house tax and other obligations. If any candidate has been convicted for an offence which carries an imprisonment term of seven years or more he or she is automatically is disqualified.
Not only Lalu Prasad Yadav but even the late J Jayalalithaa were disqualified after being convicted in the fodder and disproportionate assets scam. There is a lot of cheating in the declaration of assets. Though the Altinho bungalow of Pallavi Dempo is probably worth Rs20crore or more it is shown only at Rs8 crore. This is true of other assets including flats owned in Dubai and even London. The assets are shown at book value and not at the market value.
Significantly, Pallavi Dempo has not declared the gold and diamond jewelry she adorns herself with at all family and social functions. The jewelry is again grossly undervalued. But this is true of every candidate whether it is Narendra Modi or Dimple Yadav, the wife of the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav.
Rival candidates can give a walkover to each other by deliberately making mistakes in their nomination paper. In Gujarat a BJP candidate was elected unopposed to parliament following some mistakes made in filing the nomination by the Congress candidate. The obvious conclusion is that the Congress candidate was bribed.

CODE OF CONDUCT
THERE is an elaborate code of conduct which covers the behavior of candidates, polling officials, party workers and the voters themselves. To cite a simple example candidates or parties are not supposed to put up supervising officers at a table within 20 meters of a polling booth.
In the recent Taleigao village Panchayat elections it became a major argument between Taeigao candidate Cecille Rodrigues and Panjim MLA Babush Monserrate over the fact that the Babush group has set up a tent within the prohibited distance. Cecille has also accused Babush of intimidating the opposing candidates into withdrawing their nomination.
I have gone through this experience. Some years ago I thought I would contest elections to the Corporation of the City of Panaji from Dona Paula where I was residing. I filed my nomination and submitted all the necessary documents. Some local citizens including the activist, the late Sylvester, and Dona Paula Devika Sequiera came to my residence and literally forced me to withdraw my papers as a candidate. Their argument was that I was a bhaile (outsider although I have lived and adopted Goa as my home for the last 40 years).
They wanted to get another more local candidate than me to win and so they brainwashed me into thinking that I was not the perfect winning candidate like the other niz Goenkar. I reluctantly agreed to withdraw and the nominee of the anti-BJP group lost his deposit.

USE AND ABUSE
THERE are lots of restrictions to ensure that muscle and money power are not used and abused in at election time. Candidates or parties are not permitted to transport voters from their homes to the polling booth. This is violated wholesale. Candidates are not supposed to appeal for votes in the name of religion, caste or community. It is a common site to see candidates visiting every temple and every church. Significantly, the BJP candidates have not been visiting any mosques in the states. But I am not aware of the Congress candidates Khalap and Viriato visiting any mosque.
Candidates and parties register all the migrants coming into Goa. Within a few months a new migrant coming to Goa is able to get not only an Adhaar card but a ration card for voter identity. In theory no ration cards or voter identity cards may be issued until the voting rights at their home town or village are surrendered.
Any citizen of India can have a ration card and voter identity card only in his original native town or village. If he decides to apply for domicile in another state as his new home he will have to get a no objection certificate from his native place.
The government of Goa has announced holidays on the polling days in the neighboring states. This is on the presumption that a number of migrant settlers in Goa would be going back to their home state to cast their vote. The Election Commission should check if those who avail of this holiday are not registered in Goa also.
Parties and candidates are not permitted to bribe the voters. It is routine for candidates of all parties to offer motor bikes, scooters, bicycles and consumer durables on the eve of every election. It is also routine for candidates and parties to contribute funds to temples, churches, mosques. In Goa candidates have of course to sponsor football tournaments. In view of the ongoing IPL matches and the Indian Super League in football candidates are expected to provide television sets. Election time is the best time to ask for regularization of illegal structures.
The demolishing of illegal structures of Karnataka migrants in Sangolda by the Dr Pramod Sawant government was a warning to migrants to vote for the BJP. Indeed, the BJP shifted the venue of Narendra Modi’s public meeting in Goa on April 27, 2024 from Curchorem to Sancoale because of the large migrant population in Sancoale. Indeed, the whole of the port town Vasco da Gama district is populated by migrant residents.
Goa has been very lucky for Narendra Modi. The prime minister admitted the positive role played by Goa in his political career. In 2002 at a meeting of the BJP national executive, the then Prime Minister Atal Beihari Vajpayee wanted to sack Narendra Modi. This was immediately after the post-Godhra riots when Modi targeted the Muslim community.

RAJ DHARMA
VAJPAYEE publically accused Narendra Modi of not following “Raj Dharma.” Modi cut short his visit to Goa and took a flight back to Gujarat to resign as the chief minister of Gujarat. Later that night there was a dinner hosted in honor of Vajpayee at the Raj Bhavan. LK Advani asked Vajpayee to forgive Modi. Vajpayee could not resist the pressure from the party. Modi got a fresh lease of life. Then again during the BJP national executive in 2012 it was proposed that Modi should be projected as prime minister candidate in the 2014 Lok Sabha election. This was resisted by senior BJP leader like LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi.
It was Manohar Parrikar who pushed through the proposal to make Narendra Modi the chief spokesperson of the BJP. This was only one step to be declared the prime ministerial candidate. When Modi came to power he discarded LK Advani and other senior BJP leaders. Not surprisingly, during his speech on Saturday, April 27, 2024 at Sancoale, Modi did not mention or remember the late Manohar Parrikar who crowned him prime minister. This comes on top of taking the credit for the surgical strike which was planned and executed by Manohar Parrikar. This is part and parcel of Narendra Modi’s policy of using and discarding people.