Lucknow, Oct 29 (PTI) The Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council elections have ignited the old EVMs vs ballot paper debate, months ahead of the 2027 UP assembly polls. Elections for 11 graduate and teachers'' constituency seats were held using ballot papers.
Although the BJP retained its dominant position by winning six seats, the state's main opposition party, the Samajwadi Party, surged ahead, winning five seats -- two more than in 2020.
Polling was held on October 23 and the counting of votes began on Tuesday.
After the results were declared, the BJP state chief and Union minister Pankaj Chaudhary targeted the Congress. "The BJP has retained its seats. Its vote share has also increased. The parties demanding ballot papers could not muster the courage to contest the elections," Chaudhary said, rejecting the opposition's pitch for polls through ballot paper in 2027 and beyond.
The Samajwadi Party, however, hit back, saying the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council (MLC) elections proved the opposition gained ground when voting was done by ballot.
"Why target the Congress, as it didn't contest these polls in UP? Why doesn't the BJP engage with us on the issue? Isn't it a fact that we have gained political ground in these ballot paper polls?" Samajwadi Party national secretary Ram Asrey Vishwakarma told PTI.
He said the party's demand for voting through ballot papers would gain traction in the run-up to the 2027 UP polls. "We are surely going to talk about these aspects and why the BJP is scared of ballot paper polls in the run-up to UP elections," he said.
Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav has repeatedly questioned the reliability of EVMs. In 2024, he said he would keep distrusting the machines even if his party won all 80 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh.
Yadav maintained that the debate would not end until EVMs were discontinued.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday took a swipe at the Congress over its performance in the Legislative Council elections. In a post on X, he asked, "MLC elections in 28 seats across 4 big states -- Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar and Karnataka. Elections held using ballot papers. Guess how many seats Congress won?"
The Congress did not contest the MLC elections in UP.
In Uttar Pradesh, the SP won five seats, while the BJP retained its tally of six. BJP's Manvendra Pratap Singh won the Agra Graduates' constituency; Dinesh Kumar Goyal from the Meerut Graduates' constituency; Hari Singh Dhillon from the Bareilly-Moradabad Teachers' constituency; Umesh Dwivedi from the Lucknow Teachers' constituency; Shrichand Sharma from the Meerut Teachers' constituency; and Dhruv Kumar Tripathi from the Gorakhpur-Faizabad Teachers' constituency.
Samajwadi Party's Man Singh Yadav won the Allahabad-Jhansi Graduates' constituency; Kanti Singh won the Lucknow Graduates' constituency; Ashutosh Sinha won the Varanasi Graduates' constituency; Lal Bihari Yadav won the Varanasi Teachers' constituency; and Akash Agrawal won the Agra-Aligarh Teachers' constituency.
