When the counting began for the Gujarat assembly elections in morning, it looked like Gujarat might head towards a hung assembly as initial trends showed a neck to neck fight between the Congress and the BJP in Gujarat, with the Congress leading in the Saurashtra-Kutch region and BJP holding fort in south Gujarat.
Things have worked out in the BJP’s favour since then and as per Election Commission data, the ruling party seems to be hovering around the 98 seat mark and the Congress is projected to win about 78 seats.
While the election counting drama was playing out, the various leaders and its hardcore supporters came out to react to their party’s performance.
These reactions though might become a story in themselves as, on one hand some leaders are claiming that the Congress has achieved a moral victory in the state and on the other hand, some are claiming that the party has been hard done due to EVM tampering.
This EVM tampering theory was spread by Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam and Congress supporter Tehseen Poonawalla who incidentally is on a crusade to prove these conspiracy theories:
I still stand by this tweet. This would have been the result if #EVM would not have been tampered.#GujaratElection https://t.co/FRsvaV6sLq
— Sanjay Nirupam (@sanjaynirupam) December 18, 2017
The Election Commission and EVM have won. The people of Gujarat and India have lost #GujaratVerdict#GujaratResults#ElectionResults#Dec18WithTimesNow#AssemblyElections2017#GujaratElection#GujaratElection2017
— Tehseen Poonawalla (@tehseenp) December 18, 2017
Senior Congress leaders like Shashi Tharoor and former Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot decided to differ and claimed that the results were actually a moral victory for the Congress:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ob5cTgOvWyQ?start=36]
Here Ashok Gehlot is clearly heard saying that, whatever may be the result, only the Congress party will be considered victorious in the eyes of the nation.
Shashi Tharoor too is seen claiming that the Congress hasn’t done badly and the trend suggests a ‘positive direction’:
We haven’t done badly at all; trend suggests a positive direction: Shashi Tharoorhttps://t.co/JSmH3BA1yy
— moneycontrol (@moneycontrolcom) December 18, 2017
These contradictions throw up a paradox. If the Congress party has indeed achieved a ‘moral victory’ and EVMs too were tampered with, then some might question whether these faulty EVMs played some role in Congress achieving that ‘moral victory.
It also might solidify the theory that, EVM and their alleged tampering was merely Congress’s focal point to attack the BJP or a defence mechanism to hide its own shortcomings.
