EC seeks Haryana CEO's response on 'abusive language' toward AAP
The Election Commission (EC) has sought a report from Haryana's chief electoral officer regarding the use of offensive language on its Suvidha portal. This action was prompted by a complaint from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which claimed that their application for rallies was not only rejected but also met with derogatory remarks. While the portal is the EC's centralized system for processing rally permissions, applications for such events are normally handled by local district officials via the portal, ENCORE.
AAP candidate reports offensive remarks on portal
Sushil Kumar Gupta, the AAP candidate from Kurukshetra, reported that the party had submitted requests for two events through the Suvidha portal. One application was rejected with "koni dende" (meaning 'rejected'), while the other was also dismissed with an offensive comment. The incident was confirmed by the Deputy Commissioner of Kaithal, who stated, "The user ID of Assistant Returning Officer Kaithal, Parliamentary Constituency Kurukshetra, was misused by hitherto unknown person/s to access the ENCORE portal, and make derogatory posts therein."
5 suspended following offensive language incident
In response to the incident, five individuals have been suspended and a case has been filed at the Cyber Crime Police Station in Kaithal. The deputy commissioner confirmed, "Action has been taken, including the suspension of five individuals suspected to be involved in the incident and filing of FIR No. 0012 dated April 5, 2024." Another official stated that they had not ruled out the possibility that the portal might have been hacked.
Check out AAP's allegations here
AAP levels additional accusations against EC
Even before this offensive language incident, the AAP had called out the ECI for its conduct toward the party. Party leader Atishi claimed that a notice issued to her by the EC was circulated in the media before she received it via email. Furthermore, Atishi mentioned that the AAP had lodged a complaint about "objectionable hoardings" against them by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Delhi, but the EC has yet to issue a notice to the BJP.
