No access to external agency, process robust: EC response to INDIA bloc on EVM concerns via FAQs

The updated FAQs were uploaded on August 23 and cover 76 questions; the earlier version answered 39 questions.

Among the new questions answered on the FAQ page is whether the two EVM manufacturers, Bharat Electronics Ltd and Electronics Corporation of India Ltd, “share the confidential software programme with foreign chip manufacturers to copy it on to microcontrollers used in the EVMs”.

In its reply, the EC writes: “Microcontrollers are ported with firmware by BEL/ECIL inside their factories under high level of security and safeguards. Out of a 4 layered secure manufacturing process (secure manufacturing facility), the microcontrollers are ported in the L3 area where only designated engineers are authorised access through access cards and biometric scans. No external agency either indigenous or foreign is involved in loading the firmware programme in micro controllers.”

On VVPAT (voter verifiable paper audit trail), the EC writes that VVPATs have two kinds of memories — one where the program instructions are kept for the microcontrollers that can be programmed one time only and the other where graphical images are stored, where symbols of candidates are loaded in presence of candidates or their representatives.

To the question, “How are ECI EVMs different from the voting systems banned by the German Constitutional Court?”, the FAQ page says EVMs are manufactured by Union government PSUs in secure facilities and undergo rigorous third-party testing. “The German Constitutional Court made its observation in the context of EVMs used in German elections and in relation to German law. Indian EVMs are robust and implement technologies and processes which are different and non-comparable. Hon’ble Supreme Court of India and various High Courts have time and again scrutinised the machines and have reposed their confidence and faith in ECI EVMs,” the EC says.

The FAQs also cover several claims about tampering of EVMs and the EC’s replies to those. To the claim that EVMs can be manipulated using cellphone or bluetooth devices, the EC says: “The claim is baseless and unscientific… The technical information about the micro controllers is available in public domain and can be accessed on the website of microcontroller manufacturers…If these controllers had internal Bluetooth or Wi-Fi module then information in the form of features, internal block diagram of the microcontrollers, pin assignment and signals at all pins of the module would be available in the data sheets.”

Another question posed in the FAQs is whether media reports about 2 million EVMs going missing are true. “The matter is sub-judice and necessary clarifications have been provided to the Hon’ble High Court of Bombay. The issue is nothing more than the twisting, selective and wrongful representation of facts by vested interests,” the EC replies.

Apart from the new questions and claims that the FAQs address, the page on the ECI website includes information on the manufacturing, cost, testing, transportation and deployment of EVMs and VVPATs.