'EVMS HAVE ELIMINATED BOOTH CAPTURING': 5 IMPORTANT OBSERVATIONS MADE BY SUPREME COURT IN EVM-VVPAT CASE

New Delhi: The Supreme Court Friday rejected pleas seeking complete cross-verification of votes cast using EVMs with a Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips and said "blindly distrusting" any aspect of the system can breed unwarranted scepticism.

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta delivered two concurring verdicts and dismissed all the pleas in the matter, including those seeking to go back to ballot papers in elections.

Pronouncing his verdict, Justice Khanna directed the Election Commission to seal and store units used to load symbols for 45 days after the symbols have been loaded to electronic voting machines in strong rooms.

The top court also allowed engineers of the EVM manufacturers to verify the microcontroller of the machines after declaration of the results on the request of candidates who stood second and third.

Here are 5 key observations made by Supreme Court today:

1. "Petitioners' apprehensions are misplaced. Reverting to the paper ballot system, rejecting inevitable march of technological advancement, and burdening the Election Commission with the onerous task of 100% VVPAT slips tallying would be a folly when the challenges faced in conducting the elections are of such gargantuan scale".
2. "We must reject as foible and unsound the submission to return to the ballot paper system. The weakness of the ballot paper system is well known and documented. In the Indian context, keeping in view the vast size of the Indian electorate of nearly 97 crore, the number of candidates who contest the elections, the number of polling booths where voting held, and the problems faced with ballot papers, we would be undoing the electoral reforms by directing reintroduction of the ballot papers".
3. "EVMs offer significant advantages. They have effectively eliminated booth capturing by restricting the rate of vote casting to 4 votes per minute, thereby prolonging the time needed and thus check insertion of bogus votes. EVMs have eliminated invalid votes, which were a major issue with paper ballots and had often sparked disputes during the counting process. Furthermore, EVMs reduce paper usage and alleviate logistical challenges. Finally, they provide administrative convenience by expediting the counting process and minimizing errors."
4. "We have conducted an in-detail review of the administrative and technical safeguards of the EVM mechanism. Our discussion aims to address the uncertainties and provide assurance regarding the integrity of the electoral process. A voting mechanism must uphold and adhere".
5. "I also wish to observe that while maintaining a balanced perspective is crucial in evaluating systems or institutions, blindly distrusting any aspect of the system can breed unwarranted scepticism and impede progress. Instead, a critical yet constructive approach, guided by evidence and reason, should be followed to make room for meaningful improvements and to ensure the system's credibility and effectiveness".
6. "Over the years, more and more voters have participated in the election process. Had the voters any doubt regarding the efficacy of the EVMs, I wonder whether the voting percentage would have seen such increase. EVMs have stood the test of time and the increased voting percentage is sufficient reason for us to hold that the voters have reposed faith in the current system and that the report to the contrary, which has been relied on, merits outright rejection."

2024-04-26T09:59:45Z dg43tfdfdgfd