The entire world had seen how YSR Congress party MLA from Macherla Pinnelli Ramakrishna Reddy barged into the polling station at Palwaigate village in his constituency and smashed the electronic voting machine and VVPAT machine on the polling day on May 13 during the recent elections in Andhra Pradesh.
It is a different matter that the Telugu Desam Party people had virtually resorted to rigging the polls at this polling booth, but one cannot justify the action of Pinnelli in smashing the EVM. He was a responsible MLA at that time.
As the video went viral, the police were forced to book a case against him under the direction of the Election Commission of India.
He, however, has got bail in the instance, but was arrested in a different case of assaulting a police inspector at Karampudi, after the high court rejected his bail petition.
As a president of the YSRCP, former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is justified in calling on Pinnelli in jail and extending moral support to him. But having been in responsible position of the chief minister, he cannot defend his party leader for smashing the EVM and VVPAT machine.
Speaking to reporters after meeting Pinnelli, Jagan strongly defended Pinnelli for destroying the EVM.
“Yes, he did it at the polling booth. But you must understand why he had done that. Why would he go there if the polling was going in favour of the YSRCP and destroy the EVM?” he asked.
He even said even the high court had acknowledged the injustice done to Pinnelli and had granted him bail in the EVM tampering case.
A video clipping of Jagan’s comments has gone viral on social media and he is being subject to heavy trolling since afternoon. His comments have led to the impression that Pinnelli had smashed the EVM only because the people were voting against him.
Jagan seems to have forgotten the fundamental point that destruction of an EVM is an electoral crime. He spoke as if it was not an offence at all.
“He destroyed the EVM only because he felt injustice was being done to him at the polling station,” he argued.
“It would have been fine with Jagan had he confined to criticising the TDP government for harassing the YSRCP workers and filing false cases against the party leaders. He should have kept silent on the EVM destruction. But the way he defended it has only shown him in bad light,” an analyst said.