Thursday, May 9

Supreme Court Stands Firm On EVM Integrity; Advocate Prashant Bhushan Reacts

Edited by Aishwarya Krishnan
Supreme Court Stands Firm On EVM Integrity; Advocate Prashant Bhushan Reacts

The Supreme Court of India has dismissed petitions demanding comprehensive verification of votes cast through Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) with Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips.

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) in the case, expressed his dissatisfaction with the court’s decision in a tweet. He highlighted the persistent distrust among voters regarding EVMs. He had advocated for measures like providing VVPAT slips to voters for placement in a ballot box or keeping the VVPAT machine’s light on during counting, for the purposes of transparency and accountability.

“Since EVMs & VVPATS have programmable chips in which a malicious program can be loaded to manipulate votes, & since Voters have deep distrust of EVMs, we had asked the SC to either: Go back to paper ballots, or; Give VVPAT slip to the voter to put in a ballot box & then count VVPAT slips; or keep the light on in the VVPAT machine & count all the slips,” stated Bhushan.

He added, “Today only 2 percent VVPAT slips are matched with EVM. SC today rejected our demands…”

The bench comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta addressed these concerns during the hearing, rejecting the plea to reintroduce paper ballots and affirming the reliability of the current EVM-VVPAT system.

The top court has instead given three directions regarding the same.

The Election Commission of India (ECI) was directed to explore the feasibility of incorporating barcodes on VVPAT slips for mechanical counting, sealing and preserving the Symbol Loading Unit (SLU) for 45 days post-elections, and allowing losing candidates to request examination of EVMs’ “burnt memory” at their expense.

Justice Khanna, while delivering the verdict, mentioned, “We rejected all pleas related to bringing ballot papers again.” Justice Datta emphasized the importance of creating trust and collaboration in democracy, highlighting that unwarranted suspicions could disrupt harmony. “Blindly distrusting a system can lead to unwarranted suspicions. Democracy is all about maintaining harmony and trust among all the pillars. By nurturing a culture of trust and collaboration we can strengthen the voice of our democracy,” he added.