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Villagers in Vijayapura, K'taka, damaged ballots, EVM; 23 arrested

Villagers in Vijayapura district stopped a poll duty vehicle carrying EVMs, manhandled an officer and damaged control and ballot units following which 23 people were arrested, the EC said

Photo: Flickr/IncrediblyNuming (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

Photo: Flickr/IncrediblyNuming (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

Press Trust of India Bengaluru

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Villagers of Masabinala in Vijayapura district stopped a poll duty vehicle carrying electronic voting machines (EVMs), manhandled an officer and damaged control and ballot units on Wednesday following which 23 people were arrested, the Election Commission said.

The villagers stopped a section officer's vehicle which was carrying reserved EVMs for the Assembly elections and damaged two control and ballot units each and three VVPATs (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail), the EC said in a statement.

"Sector officer was manhandled. 23 people arrested", the EC said, adding, top district officials rushed to the village, which comes under Basavana Bagewadi Assembly segment.

 

According to Police sources, the villagers' "action" came after "rumours" that officials were "changing" the EVMs and VVPATs.

Meanwhile, in Padmanabhanagar constituency here, some youth armed with sticks attacked their political rivals in a polling booth at Papaiah Garden. They went on a rampage in which a few women standing in queue to vote sustained injuries, the sources said.

In another incident at Sanjeevarayanakote in Ballari district, some Congress and the BJP workers came to blows.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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First Published: May 10 2023 | 5:00 PM IST

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