The Election Commission on Sunday wrote back to the Telugu Desam Party pointing out that the name of its technical adviser Hari Prasad, arrested for EVM theft in 2010, was not there in the list of delegates provided by the party when Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu and his team met with the poll panel on Saturday.
“During the meeting, Shri Hari Prasad was invited by the Chief Election Commissioner to come for discussion with Prof Shahani, chairman, technical expert committee, and Shri Sudeep Jain, deputy election commissioner, being oblivious of his background which the Commission came to know later,” EC stated in its letter to the TDP legal cell chief.
It was only after EC checked the name of TDP experts being deputed to meet Mr Jain and Mr Shahani, that the Andhra Prasad resident commissioner took Hari Prasad’s name.
This alerted the EC officials who recalled that a Hyderabad-based researcher by the same name had been arrested in a one-of-a-kind EVM theft case in 2010.
When EC searched his antecedents, it discovered that it was indeed the EVM theft-accused who had met the CEC with Naidu’s delegation and also deputed by the CM for a more detailed discussion on EVMs with EC experts.
EC on Sunday conveyed to TDP that it was always open to suggestions with its technical expert committee carrying out a detailed in-depth root cause analysis of any technical glitch reported from the field.
“If you may like to send any other expert, you may kindly send as the Commission is not comfortable in interacting with Shri Hari Prasad, as already communicated,” said EC.