A review petition has been filed in the Supreme Court questioning the court’s recent decision to reject a plea to tally every Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slip with votes cast through Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).
Arun Kumar Agarwal, the petitioner contended that there are mistakes and errors apparent in the April 26 judgment. The plea stated that it is not correct to mention that the result will be unreasonably delayed by tallying EVM votes with VVPAT slips, or the manpower required will be the double of that already deployed. It added that existing CCTV surveillance of counting halls would ensure that manipulation and mischief does not occur in VVPAT slip counting.
A bench of Justice Sanjiv Kumar and Justice Dipankar Datta had dismissed the plea while also rejecting a suggestion to go back to a paper ballot based system of voting instead of having EVMs. The apex court had stressed the need to nurture a culture of trust and collaboration to strengthen democracy while dismissing the plea.
Nonetheless, the court directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) and other authorities to take certain steps to bolster more confidence in EVMs. These measures include completion of the symbol loading process, the symbol loading units (SLUs) shall be sealed, the sealed container shall be kept in the strong rooms for 45 days. The court also said that all candidates shall have the option to be present at the time of verification and that the district election officer shall certify the authenticity of the burnt memory.
It added that the burnt memory in the micro-controller unit is to be checked by a team of engineers. However, the petitioner has now argued in the review petition that these measures are not adequate. The plea stated that the entire discussion on the SLU ignores the fact that SLU is vulnerable and needs to be audited. It also asserted that the court completely overlooked the possibility that the data in the SLU can have extra bytes other than just the necessary images.
The review plea underlined that the April 26 judgment incorrectly notes that currently, 5 percent of the VVPAT slips are tallied with votes cast, when in practice only 1.97 per cent of VVPAT slips are tallied with EVM votes.
Furthermore, the plea also stated that EVMs do not allow voters to verify that their votes have been accurately recorded. Furthermore, the plea mentioned that given their very nature, EVMs are especially vulnerable to malicious changes by insiders like designers, programmers, manufacturers, maintenance technicians, etc. The review plea has been lodged through advocate Neha Rathi.