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The Congress has rejected the outcome of the Haryana Assembly election, raising “serious questions” about the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).
Congress general secretary in charge of communications Jairam Ramesh said some candidates had noticed that on EVMs that had 99% battery charge, the party had lost, while those with a charge of 60-70% showed a victory for the Congress.
The party did not elaborate on this allegation on Tuesday. It said it would bring the issue to the notice of the Election Commission of India (ECI) over the coming days.
Lok Sabha Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi posted on X on Wednesday (October 9) that the Congress would take up complaints coming from several Vidhan Sabha seats with the ECI, but gave no details of those complaints.
EVMs run on alkaline batteries (instead of electricity), so they can be used in areas that do not have electricity. According to the ECI, the control unit (CU) of the EVM has a power pack of 7.5 volts or 8 volts, and the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) unit, which is attached to the EVM, has its own power pack of 22.5 volts.
The EVM batteries are manufactured by the two public sector undertakings that make the machines themselves, Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) and Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL).
In the Frequently Asked Questions section of its website, the ECI says: “The power packs of CU and VVPAT are periodically monitored and the balance power status is displayed by the control unit as “High”, “Medium”, “Low”, “Marginal” and “Change Battery” along with the percentage. The power packs are replaced from the “Reserve” power packs available with the Sector Officers when the “Change Battery” status is displayed by the CU.”
ECI sources said a new battery usually lasts for an entire election and counting process, and can sometimes be used in case of a re-election in that constituency as well. The display unit shows “99%” charge till the time the electric potential of the battery is between 7.4 volts and 8 volts, the sources said. Once the level falls below 7.4 volts, the actual percentage of the charge is displayed. When the battery reaches 5.8 volts, the display unit shows an indication to change the battery.
How long the battery lasts depends on the usage — how many votes were cast during the mock poll, how many times the votes were totalled by pressing the ‘total’ button, and the number of votes cast during the poll.
A new battery is installed in the EVM at the time of first-level checking before any election. Political parties are informed beforehand, and their representatives can be present during the check.
On the day of the poll, a mock poll is held before electors are let inside the polling stations, again in the presence of the polling agents of candidates. If the battery level dips during the polling, and the battery has to be changed, it is done in the presence of the polling agents of the candidates.
The EVM Manual of the ECI says: “In case the power pack of CU does not function properly or show low battery, replace power pack of CU. For this purpose presiding officer shall replace the power pack of CU in presence of polling agents and sector officer and again seal the battery section of CU with address tag and obtain their signatures.”
At the close of the poll, the presiding officer of each polling station has to submit a report to the EC about any battery change as a part of the overall presiding officers’ report. The format includes the unique ID of the control unit, the reason for replacement of the power pack of the CU, and signatures of polling agents present.
So what has the Congress alleged?
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, Jairam Ramesh said the party had received very serious complaints regarding the counting process from at least three districts, and more were coming in. 10-12 Assembly constituencies were affected, he said.
“Did you understand the conspiracy? Wherever there was a 99 per cent battery, the BJP won. And where the battery is less than 70 per cent, the Congress won. If this is not a conspiracy, then what is?… I hope the ECI gives us time, and we can put the complaints in front of it,” he said.
However, the party has not explained the “conspiracy”, or what it thinks is the correlation between the higher battery percentage and alleged tampering. At the same time, its own senior Haryana leaders, Bhupinder Hooda and Kumari Selja, have conceded defeat.
And what has the ECI said?
So far, the ECI has not commented officially on the Congress’ allegations. However, sources said the ECI did not receive any complaints from candidates or polling agents at the time of polling regarding EVM batteries.
Earlier on Tuesday, the Congress had written to the ECI alleging a slowdown in the updates of results on the ECI’s website — a complaint that the ECI had said was “ill-founded”.
So what is the upshot of this controversy?
The Congress’ latest attack is in a long line of questions that have been raised on the functioning of EVMs by almost every party over the years.
Congress leader Digvijaya Singh had raised questions about the EVMs after the party lost power in the Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan Assemblies last year. Both the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samajwadi Party had doubted EVMs after the BJP won the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.
Over the years, however, the ECI has pointed to the several legal challenges that have failed, and maintained that the EVMs cannot be manipulated. Most recently, the Supreme Court in April rejected a plea for returning to paper ballots or 100% counting of VVPAT slips.
