EC turns down NCP-SP demand to freeze trumpet symbol

The Election Commission on Tuesday said it had agreed to a request by NCP ( Sharad Pawar) for prominent display of it poll symbol -- man blowing 'turha' -- on ballot units of EVMs, but turned down the demand to freeze the trumpet symbol. Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar said the NCP-SP had conveyed to the poll authority that its election symbol -- ' man blowing turha' -- was not displayed prominently on the ballot units of EVMs.

"We had asked them to specify how would they want their poll symbol to be displayed on the ballot unit. The NCP-SP had given us three options on the poll symbol and we accepted the first suggestion made by them," Kumar said.

However, the CEC made it clear that the Commission did not wish to disturb the existing system of allocation of election symbols while turning down the demand for removal of the trumpet symbol from the list of symbols.

The CEC asserted that the trumpet symbol was different from the 'man blowing turha'.

The Sharad Pawar-led party had argued that the trumpet symbol was similar to 'man blowing turha' which caused confusion among voters during the Lok Sabha elections.

The NCP-SP had contended that independent candidate who was allotted the trumpet symbol in the Satara constituency polled more votes than the margin of victory of the BJP candidate Udayanraje Bhonsale.

Bhonsale had defeated NCP-SP candidate Shashikant Shinde by a margin of 32,771 votes. Independent candidate Sanjay Gade, who contested the election on trumpet symbol, had polled 37,062 votes.