Chandrababu Naidu to meet EC along with 21 Opposition leaders today to demand votes be counted through VVPAT tally on 23 May

New Delhi: A delegation of 21 opposition parties along with Andhra Pradesh chief minister and TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu will knock the doors of Election Commission of India (ECI) at 3 pm on Tuesday, pressing their demand of tallying VVPAT slips with EVM figures in an entire Assembly constituency, in case a discrepancy is found in any polling booth. Ahmed Patel of Congress, Sharad Pawar of NCP, Satish Chandra Misra of BSP, Sitaram Yechury of Communist Party of India (Marxist), D Raja of Communist Party of India (CPI) and Derek O’Brien of the TMC are expected to meet the EC. [caption id=“attachment_5232171” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of N Chandrababu Naidu. News18[/caption] On 18 May, Naidu urged the Election Commission to count votes through Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) instead of EVMs during counting for the Lok Sabha polls. On 7 May, the Supreme Court turned down a review plea by 21 opposition parties seeking a direction to increase random physical verification of VVPAT from five to at least 50 percent of EVMs. The review petition was filed after the Supreme Court on 8 April directed the ECI to increase physical counting of VVPAT slips to 5 random EVMs in each constituency. Earlier, only VVPAT slips from one EVM in every Assembly segment or constituency was subjected to physical verification.