Waikar OTP Case: Returning officer says 'EVM non-programmable'
Mumbai: Vandana Suryavanshi, Returning officer of the Mumbai North West constituency, stated that OTP was not used for the purpose of unlocking the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) as it was non-programmable. The machine does not have any wireless or wired communication capabilities, she said. Suryavanshi was addressing the media at the Collector's office in Bandra on Sunday.
Suryavanshi said that EVM's were standalone devices with no external connectivity and therefore it has no One Time Password (OTP) system to unclock them. "We seal the machines after voting and open them with the signatures of the counting agents on them", she clarified. However, OTPs were required at the ENCORE system where the Election Commission (EC) data was updated and EVMs had no connection with this, she added.
Referring to the controversy surrounding Shiv Sena Candidate Ravindra Waikar, Vandana Suryavanshi said that "On June 4, during the counting of votes, a mobile phone was found inside the NESCO centre. We informed the police immediately to act accordingly. The complaint was raised by candidates Surinder Arora and Bharat Shah who caught Pandilkar with a phone, and we handed over the phone and Pandilkar to the police to take cognizable action". However, the Vanrai Police registered the FIR after June 11. Police later told the EC representatives that ENCORE operator Dinesh Gurav had given his phone to Pandilkar.
Speaking on the issues related to sharing the CCTV of the incident with the police, Suryavanshi said that it couldn't be done until an order from 'a competent court'. She said that after declaring of results on the counting day, Kirthikar and his party had only made a claim about their counting agent counting more votes than Ravindra Waikar. They had lodged a written complaint regarding this on the spot. She denied any manipulation happening inside the NESCO centre where the counting was held.
Stressing on the impossibility of any EVMs being hacked, the returning officer said that there was no mention of any OTPs in the FIR lodged by the EC. However, it mentioned about the ENCORE process. ENCORE is an online system where the assistant returning officer uses an OTP to generate data entries. That is why the EC had allowed mobile phones inside the NESCO center, she said. Suryavanshi stated that manual entry votes were also counted three times in the counting centre.
Collector Rajendra Shankar Kshirsagar was also present at the press meet.
During the Lok Sabha Election of 2024, Ravindra Waikar of Shiv Sena's Shindhe faction had won by a very low margin of 48 votes against Amol Kirtikar of the UBT faction in Mumbai North West. The controversy erupted when Mangesh Pandilkar, a counting agent and close relative of Waikar, was accused of operating a mobile phone inside the counting center on June 4. Surinder Arora from the Bharat Jan Aadhar Party and Bharat Khimji Shah from the Hindu Samaj Party had registered a complaint in this regard at the Vanrai police station and the police had confiscated the phone from Pandilkar.
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Indian-American couple sentenced to prison for forcing relative to work at gas station
Washington, Jun 26: A US court has sentenced an Indian-American couple to prison for coercing their relative to work at their gas station and convenience store for over three years by bringing him to the United States on the pretext of helping enrol him in a school.
Harmanpreet Singh, 31, was sentenced to 135 months (11.25 years) in prison and Kulbir Kaur, 43, to 87 months (7.25 years) by the court that also asked them to pay the victim, his cousin, USD 225,210.76 (Rs 1.87 crores approximately) in restitution.
The couple has since divorced.
"The defendants exploited their relationship with the victim to lure him to the United States with false promises that they would help enrol him in school," Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division said.
"The defendants confiscated the victim's immigration documents and subjected him to threats, physical force and mental abuse to coerce him to work long hours for minimal pay," she said.
"This sentence should send a strong message that such forced labour will not be tolerated in our communities," she added.
US Attorney Jessica D Aber for the Eastern District of Virginia said the defendants preyed on the victim's earnest desire to attain an education and improve his life.
Instead, they deprived him of the most basic human needs and robbed him of his freedom, the attorney said.
The evidence presented at trial demonstrated that in 2018, the defendants enticed the victim, Singh's cousin and then a minor, to travel to the US from India with false promises of helping enrol him in school, the Department of Justice said.
It said that after the victim arrived in the US, the defendants took his immigration documents and instead forced him to provide labour and services at Singh's store for over three years, between March 2018 and May 2021.
Singh and Kaur compelled the victim to work at the store, including cleaning, cooking, stocking and handling the cash register and store records, between 12 and 17 hours a day, nearly every day, for minimal pay, according to the evidence presented during the trial.
They used various coercive means, including confiscating the victim's immigration documents and subjecting the victim to physical abuse, threats of force and other serious harm, and, at times, degrading living conditions to compel him to continue working, the evidence showed.
The couple left the victim at the store to sleep in a back office for days on multiple occasions, limited his access to food, refused to provide medical care or education, used surveillance equipment to monitor the victim both at the store and in their home, refused his requests to return to India and made him overstay his visa, according to the evidence.
The defendants also forced the victim to marry Kaur and used that marriage to threaten to take the victim's family's properties or falsely report him to the police if he left.
The evidence also showed that Singh pulled the victim's hair, slapped and kicked him when he requested his immigration documents back or tried to leave. On three different occasions, he threatened the victim with a revolver for trying to take a day off and for trying to leave.
