Journalism of Courage
The Supreme Court Tuesday asked the Election Commission of India (ECI) to ensure that polling data is not deleted from the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) while these are being verified.
The bench of Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta said this while seeking the ECI’s response to a plea by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) which alleged that the ECI’s procedure for verification of EVMs was not in accordance with the April 2024 order of the Supreme Court.
In its April 26, 2024 order, the top court allowed candidates at No. 2 and No. 3 positions the option to get the burnt memory/microcontroller of 5 per cent of EVMs per Assembly segment “checked and verified by a team of engineers from EVM manufacturers post the announcement of results” on a written request for a cost to be notified by the ECI.
On Tuesday, Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for ADR, said the ECI only does mock polls for verification of the EVMs. “What we want is that somebody should examine the software and hardware of EVM to see whether they have any element of manipulation or not,” he said.
Senior Advocate Devadatt Kamat, appearing for another petitioner, too echoed the concern and said what is done is only a mock poll and the charge is Rs 40,000. Concerns were also expressed that the previous data gets deleted during reloading.
CJI Khanna clarified what the court said was that verification can happen if anyone has a doubt.
Referring to the April 2024 judgment, the CJI said the intent behind the order was that there should be no disturbance in counting, that the machine be examined by an engineer from the EVM manufacturer, and polling data in the machines not be erased or reloaded.
“What we intended was that if after the polls somebody asks, the engineer should come and certify that according to him, in their presence, there is no tampering in any of the burnt memory or the microchips stock. That’s all,” the CJI said and asked Senior Advocate Maninder Singh, appearing for the ECI, “Why do you erase the data?”
“We didn’t want such a detailed process that you reload something… do not erase the data, do not reload the data – all you need to do is somebody should come and verify, they have to examine,” the CJI said.
The bench also referred to the submissions about the cost of verification and told Singh, “Reduce the cost of 40,000. That’s too high.”
Fixing the next hearing in the matter for March 3, the bench asked Singh to file a short affidavit explaining the procedure followed for verification of EVM. It also recorded his statement that “there won’t be any modification/correction of the data” in the meanwhile.
