#Gorakhpur: The DM must explain the ‘ban’ on media

The Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly witnessed an uproar today by Opposition parties centred on the bypoll. The bone of contention was the news of Gorakhpur District Magistrate Rajeev Rautela allegedly stopping the media from reporting trends for the Gorakhpur constituency.

In Phulpur, Samajwadi Party candidate Nagendra Singh Patel was leading from the first round. In Gorakhpur, Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Upendra Shukla was leading with a small margin of 1,200 votes after the completion of the first round of counting. While early trends after the first round suggested a decision in favour of SP in Phulpur, no updates on the Gorakhpur seat were forthcoming. 

Soon after, media channels reported that Rautela, who is also the Returning Officer, had barred reporters from entering the counting centre. Moreover, there were no updates on the trends after the first round.

This raised quite a few eyebrows and SP workers and leaders were quick to accuse Election Commission officials, the district administration and the governing BJP. 

SP candidate Praveen Nishad from Gorakhpur spoke to the media after the counting of nine rounds, “I am afraid about the final results. After the nine round of counting, we are leading by 18,000 votes. While despite being kilometres away from Phulpur we are getting regular updates, but we know very less about the Gorakhpur seat.” Nishad, however, maintained that so far the counting inside the centre had been fair. He raised concerns over the media not being allowed to report on the trends.

But what is the procedure laid down by the Election Commission of India for the counting day? Apropos media coverage, the guidelines clearly state that: “In order to bring as much transparency as possible to the electoral process, the media are encouraged and provided with facilities to cover the election, although subject to maintaining the secrecy of the vote. Media persons are given special passes to enter polling stations to cover the poll process and the counting halls during the actual counting of votes.”

Here are few key points related to counting centre and flow of information according to a 2014 circular:

• The officers related to counting must reach the centre an hour before the counting is scheduled to start.
• The opening of the strong room: The returning officer should commence the counting at the hour fixed for the purpose. The strong room, where polled electronic voting machines (EVMS) are kept in safe custody, should be opened in the presence of RO, contesting candidates or their election agents and ECI officials/observers. The entire process of opening of the strong room should be video-graphed and entries should be made.
• First, the ballot boxes are counted and then votes of EVMS are counted. Seal of each EVM is checked before the counting starts.
• The round-wise result is announced by the RO after completion of counting all EVMs in that round, and ECI officials parallel counting of two randomly selected EVMs, and round-wise tabulation is completed. The RO signs the required documents.
• The announcement of round-wise results: The ECI observer and RO will sign the candidate-wise results for that round after checking everything and ensure that the results of counting of votes are immediately displayed prominently.
  The same should be announced through public address system. Importantly, a copy of the round’s results should be handed over to all candidates and their agents present after completion of that round.The media too needs to be informed about the updates. The officials are supposed to hand over a copy of the print out to the media room for the press. Another copy of the results is sent to communication room for uploading of the round-wise results [emphasis added].
• Intimation to the Chief Election Officer:  The results are to be faxed to the CEO and it should be orally confirmed through phone lines. The ECI guidelines say that if the information is received orally by phone or hotline, the CEOs should have blank forms to keep track of round-wise data.

Clearly, as per the ECI guidelines, it was incumbent upon the administration of Gorakhpur to keep journalists abreast with the latest trends after each round.

However, it is to be noted that the Returning Officer reserves the power of blocking entry of any person to the counting centre – if he or she is in violation of the rules or creates problems in the counting process.

Former Chief Election Commissioner of India N Gopalaswami told Newslaundry, “The final authority in the process of counting is the local administration, that is, the returning officer. If the Returning Officers have sufficient reasons, he can block the entry of the media. But he must have sufficient reasons.” He added, “Normally there are no such restrictions but the RO is the final authority.” 

In this case, the reasons aren’t clear and the DM has only stated that announcements take time. Surely, he needs to come up with a more detailed explanation of the exact reasons for barring the media from reporting on such a keenly-watched election result.