As the nation prepares itself to for the general elections, the Opposition parties in India have strongly expressed their reservations about the integrity of the (Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in the country. Infact, over the past few days, there is resentment brewing in the country against EVMs, with politicians, organistions and voters demanding to revert to the paper ballot system.
Many organisations, including political parties, have openly expressed their distrust towards EVMs. On January 32, a huge crowd protested against the EVM machines at Jantar Mantar in Delhi and demanded that ballots be used to conduct the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. Many other protests took place in other parts of the country on the same day. The main accusation levelled by the protestors is that these machines can be manipulated and so voters should get the slip from VVPAT (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail) machines if at all the EVMs have to be used. As per the protestors, VVPAT slips would help in verifying the votes cast by the voters. However, it is highly unlikely that the Election Commission of India (ECI) will implement this demand during the upcoming elections. Infact, the accusations regarding possibilities of manipulation with EVMs are not new but they only intensified after BJP’s landslide victories from 2014 onwards at the Centre and States. Responding to such allegations, the ruling party has claimed that the Opposition brings up the topic of EVMs only when the poll results go against them, but do not utter a word when results are in their favour. Meanwhile, the ECI is firm on its stance that EVMs cannot be manipulated and has challenged the anti-EVM organisations to prove the fallacies from time to time.
Although anti-EVM groups could not present concrete proofs to prove their allegations, ECI then introduced the VVPAT system as accusations kept mounting. VVPAT allows voters to confirm that their vote was cast correctly. However, this feedback lasts only for a few seconds as the voters do not receive a physical slip; something that anti-EVM groups have objected to. The ECI is of the opinion that if voters get their hands on physical slips then there are chances of he/she submitting bogus slips in the box kept at the polling booth. It will also be time-consuming to cross-check VVPAT slips with every single EVM machine as the intention behind introducing EVMs was to save time required to count votes.
One of the main reasons behind doubts over the operations of EVMs is that many technical experts have agreed to the possibility of fiddling with electronic machines as they run on a certain programme. On the other hand, the Opposition has accused the ECI of acting as a puppet of the ruling party given certain decisions delivered by the Election Commission in the recent past. This poses a serious threat to the credibility and independence of the Commission.
The Opposition is of the opinion that ECI did not take any of their complaints seriously. In such situations, the onus is on the ECI to keep the system completely transparent to prove it is unbiased. For that, voters will have to be allowed to drop their VVPAT slips in the independent ballot box and then cross-verify the votes with EVMs at least once. There is no doubt that the procedure will be time-consuming, but the ECI will have to make it happen to regain people’s confidence. Infact, this is an opportunity for the ECI, which has been at the center of some serious allegations for the past few years.
The ECI should give the codes of softwares used in EVM control units, VVPAT machines and symbol loading machines to the representatives of the political parties so that they can check the process on their own. Also, the poll results should be declared only after comparing the votes cast in EVMs and VVPAT machines. However, there is little to no chance that the ECI will be ready to go through such a long and tedious process.
Another reason for protests against EVMs to intensify is a statement made by Rajendra Pal Gautam, Delhi’s former cabinet minister, during ‘EVM Hatao’ protest at Delhi. He said in his speech that the BJP leaders are claiming to surpass the mark of 400 seats in Lok Sabha elections because four out of seven directors of Bharat Electronics Limited company are BJP leaders. The reason to mention this company is that it is the same company which has manufactured EVM machines in India. The video which has gone viral on social media has been conveniently neglected by the saffron party. It is obvious for Congress to openly oppose EVMs as apart from Telangana, the party suffered lopsided losses in four state assembly elections. Congress has questioned BJP’s victory in Madhya Pradesh when exit polls were showing only 8% vote share for the party. However, BJP has countered this by questioning as to why the Congress said nothing about EVMs when they won in Karnataka. Whilel the political accusations and rebuttals will go on, the ECI needs to take some steps on its own to prove the credibility of EVMs. While there is an atmosphere of distrust in the government system, the only justifiable component that is remaining in the country is the voting process. Autonomous bodies like ECI must never forget this.