DMK president M.K. Stalin has moved the Madras High Court seeking 100% counting of VVPAT slips in the Kolathur Assembly constituency and consequently sought a declaration that he be declared the returned candidate after nullifying the election of TVK MLA V.S. Babu, as reported in The Hindu.
Stalin, who contested the 2026 Tamil Nadu Assembly election from Kolathur, secured 74,202 votes and finished second to V.S. Babu, who polled 82,997 votes.
In his writ petition, Stalin acknowledged that Article 329(b) of the Constitution provides that no election to Parliament or a State legislature can be called into question except through an election petition. However, he contended that his writ petition was maintainable as he was challenging the post-result administrative and technical process relating to EVM and VVPAT checking and verification.
Stalin also relied on the Supreme Court’s 2024 judgment in Association for Democratic Reforms versus Election Commission of India, which permitted the runner-up or third-place candidate in a parliamentary or Assembly election to request checking and verification of the burnt memory or microcontroller in 5% of the EVMs used in the constituency by engineers from the EVM manufacturers.
Following the election result declared on May 4, Stalin submitted an application on May 7 seeking verification of 14 EVM sets, representing 5% of the 286 EVM sets used in the Kolathur constituency.
However, according to the petition, the verification process commenced only on July 29, nearly three months after the application was submitted.
“This inordinate delay (of nearly three months) is itself contrary to the spirit of the directions issued by the honourable Supreme Court, and has caused serious and irreversible prejudice to my legal rights,” the petitioner said.
Stalin informed the court that he had appointed senior counsel N.R. Elango as his representative for the verification process.
During the process, one of the VVPAT units reportedly stopped working during the mock poll and began displaying an error on July 30. Another VVPAT unit allegedly stopped working during the verification process on July 31.
According to Stalin, his representative was not provided with any report from an engineer of Bharat Electronics Limited or any other competent authority explaining the reasons for the failure of the two VVPAT units. Instead, the representative was given the option of selecting an EVM from another polling station for verification.
The petition also alleged irregularities concerning the address tags on the carrying cases of the ballot and control units of one EVM taken up for verification.
Stalin said the address tags were new and unfilled and that the seals on the tags had been affixed on the reverse side, unlike the other EVM sets where the seals were affixed on the front.
Stalin further said that Elango requested election officials on August 4 to verify EVM sets from six additional polling stations.
On August 5, another issue allegedly emerged when a ballot unit bearing Stalin’s name was unable to detect the control unit.
Describing this as an “alarming irregularity”, Stalin contended that the issue was not properly addressed. He alleged that despite these lapses, the District Election Officer passed an order on August 5 declaring that the verification process had been successfully completed.
Stalin has therefore sought 100% counting of VVPAT slips in the Kolathur constituency and has sought consequential relief, including nullification of V.S. Babu’s election and a declaration that he be returned as the elected candidate.
Stalin Challenges ECI’s EVM Verification SOP
In a separate writ petition, Stalin has also challenged the constitutional validity of certain provisions of the Standard Operating Procedure formulated by the Election Commission of India for checking and verification of the burnt memory and microcontroller in 5% of EVMs, pursuant to the Supreme Court’s directions.
He has urged the Madras High Court to declare paragraphs 4(a) and 4(c) of the Administrative SOP and paragraph 4.2(p) of the Technical SOP unconstitutional.
The two petitions come amid Stalin’s challenge to the election outcome in Kolathur and his objections to the manner in which the EVM and VVPAT verification process was conducted following the 2026 Assembly election results.
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