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Journalism of Courage
Stating that it had “full faith” in the use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), the Election Commission on Friday told Congress leader Jairam Ramesh that the EVMs and VVPATs complied with the legal framework strengthened by successive Union governments over the past 40 years.
The Opposition’s INDIA alliance had submitted a memorandum to the poll panel on August 9, 2023 raising questions over the use of EVMs and Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trails (VVPATs). In response, the EC had updated the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) section on its website to answer some of the questions, The Indian Express had reported on December 31. The Opposition, however, approached the Election Commission several times after that for a meeting on the issue. Most recently, Ramesh wrote to the panel on December 30, 2023 seeking a meeting for the INDIA alliance on the issue of VVPATs.
In its response to Ramesh on Friday, the EC said his latest letter did not “mention any specific issues on VVPAT”. It reiterated its August 23 response to the INDIA alliance, asking Ramesh to refer to the resources on its website, including the FAQs, which were updated again on Thursday.
“It is reiterated that material made available by ECI in public domain on EVMs, including latest updated FAQs, adequately and comprehensively cover all reasonable and legitimate aspects of use of EVMs in Indian election… It is stated that current EVMs in use in Indian election are compliant to the extant legal framework created and strengthened by the successive Union Governments of the day and jurisprudence evolved over more than 40 years by the Constitutional Courts of India. Anything beyond existing legal framework and established jurisprudence is beyond singular domain of the Commission,” the ECI wrote to Ramesh.
It pointed out that VVPATs were introduced on August 14, 2013. The EC said various aspects of VVPATs were sub judice before the Supreme Court. The apex court is hearing a petition seeking 100 per cent counting of VVPAT slips, as opposed to the current 2 per cent, which the EC has opposed. The INDIA alliance had passed a resolution on December 19, 2023 calling for 100 per cent counting of VVPATs. In its letter to Ramesh, the EC said political parties and candidates were involved in every stage of handling EVMs, from first-level checks to close of polls and counting.
The EC also addressed questions asked by advocate Omar Hoda in a follow-up to the INDIA alliance’s memorandum. Asked why the reports of the Technical Expert Committee on the design of the EVM and VVPAT were not made public, the EC said the reports were prepared to ensure that the machines are beyond tampering.
“Further, these reports also contain information about the manufacturing design and manufacturing processes, which are intellectual property rights of the manufacturers and ECI. It may be appreciated that sharing such data in public domain may also result in mischievous persons violating ECI’s intellectual property rights and further, may create an apprehension in public that the machines can be tampered due to critical information of the design/ technical aspects being made available in public domain. Further these can be misused by motivated individuals for creating nuisance or public order also,” it replied.
The EC also included the results of all elections since 2004 when EVMs were used across the country for the first time, showing that various parties have won elections conducted via EVMs.
“Based on the outcomes of the elections conducted using EVMs, legal framework, established jurisprudence, technical security and administrative safeguards, Commission has full faith in use of EVMs in election,” it said.
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