The poll panel passed the order after viewing the video recording of the voting process, saying two electors-- Bholabhai Gohil and Raghavjibhai Patel--had "violated the voting procedure and secrecy of ballots."
The usually quiet polls for the upper chamber of Parliament turned acrimonious and chaotic after the Congress approached the Election Commission demanding cancellation of the votes of Gohil and Patel for having shown the ballots to people other than the party's authorised representatives.
The poll panel, finally, accepted the Congress's contention and asked the returning officer to reject the votes of its two MLAs and proceed with the counting.
That the contest for three Rajya Sabha seats would go down to the wire had become clear the very day when Balwantsinh Rajput, the Congress chief whip in the state Assembly until a few days ago, defected to the BJP and was fielded to take on Ahmed Patel, the high-profile political secretary to Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
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According to the rules, voters for the Rajya Sabha elections have to show their ballots to authorised representative of their respective parties before casting them.
Prasad said the Congress was acting out of fear of losing the poll, in which its senior leader Ahmed Patel is locked in a tight fight with a Congress rebel fielded by the BJP.
Immediately, after the visit of the high-profile BJP team, Congress heavyweight P Chidambaram led another delegation to the EC.
After the meeting, Chidambarm told reporters,"If the BJP is so confident of winning the election then it must abide by the law. And the law is very clear. If the ballot is seen by a person other than the authorised person then it is liable to be rejected. BJP was beneficiary of this law on June 11, 2016. How was law changed in one year. These two ballot papers must be rejected."
Surjewala alleged that the two legislators, instead of showing their ballots to party's election agent, displayed it to BJP president Amit Shah and Union Minister Smriti Irani, which he said, "should not be accepted".
Apart from Rajput, five other Congress MLAs had also quit with two joining the BJP with him, bringing down the Congress's strength in the 282-member House to 51 from 57.
Of these, seven, including former chief minister Shankarsinh Vaghela, did not join the 44 MLAs the Congress had packed off to a resort on Bengaluru outskirts. Vaghela had resigned from Congress ahead of the exit of the six MLAs. He also quit as leader of the opposition, but retained his Assembly membership. The other six MLAs who did not join the 44 lawmakers in Bengaluru were his camp followers and were learnt to have voted for BJP.
A candidate in the current polls needs to garner 45 votes for a straight win.
The BJP, with 121 MLAs, has fielded party chief Amit Shah and Union minister Smriti Irani as its first two candidates, who will sail through. Rajput, its third nominee, has BJP's 31 surplus votes and the those of Vaghela and MLAs supporting the Kshatriya strongman.
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