Pune engineer held in EVM theft case

A Pune-based engineer and activist has been arrested by the city police in connection with a Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) theft case. Mukund Lagoo, a civil engineer and a human rights activist was arrested on Tuesday after two days of questioning. He has been accused of procuring the machine and carrying it to Hyderabad where he handed it over to main arrested accused Hari Prasad, police said on Wednesday.

Hyderabad-based researcher Hari Prasad was arrested last month for his alleged role in the EVM theft case. He was later let out on bail. Prasad was apprehended after he demonstrated on a news channel on how to tamper with an EVM. He had told the police that he had been given the machine by a few social activists

from Maharashtra.

According to investigations, Lagoo had contacted Hari Prasad and met him before the theft of the EVM. After a few days he handed over the machine to Prasad in Hyderabad, a police official said. "However, we are yet to ascertain if it was Lagoo who had stolen the machine from the Collector's office in Mumbai," he said.

The activist was produced before a local court, which remanded him to police custody till September 22. His lawyer Niranjan Mundargi said the police arrested him without informing his relatives or lawyers. "He was just called for questioning." The police has so far recorded the statement of over 20 social activists in the case including a Congress party member Dinesh Bachav from Nashik.