The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved its verdict on a batch of petitions seeking 100 percent verification of Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) data with the Voter-Verifiable Paper Audit trail (VVPAT).
On the second day of hearing, the Bench of Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta reserved the verdict on the petitions filed by the Association for Democratic Rights (ADR) and others.
During today’s full-day hearing, the Apex Court extensively interacted with an official of the Election Commission of India (ECI) to understand the working and security features of EVMs.
Appearing for ADR, Advocate-on-Record Prashant Bhushan contended that at this advanced stage, as the first phase of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections was to begin tomorrow, the easiest thing for the ECI to do was to let the light in the VVPAT screen remain lit throughout the voting time (as opposed to the present practice of keeping the light lit for 7 seconds), so that the voters could see the slip cutting and falling.
On the other hand, appearing for another petitioner, Advocate Nizam Pasha suggested that voters be allowed to physically take the VVPAT slip and deposit the same in the ballot box.
When the Apex Court asked whether it would not infringe on the voters’ secrecy, Advocate Pasha submitted that the voters’ privacy could not be used to defeat their own rights.
The Bench then commented that it hoped Advocate Pasha understood the practical results of what he was seeking.
Stating that VVPAT was meant for ‘audit,’ Senior Advocate Sanjay Hegde suggested that after the counting of EVM votes, all VVPAT slips should also be counted for an ‘audit’.
He submitted that while the counting was immediate, an audit may take time. He said there should be a separate audit, which would then add greater credibility to the counting process. The lawyer asked the Apex Court to consider the safeguards, which could be put in now.
He further requested the Bench not to consider the issue as concluded by the 2019 judgment, which directed the increase of VVPAT counts to 5 EVMs per Assembly segment in a Parliamentary constituency.
The lawyer submitted that the issue should be seen as a ‘work in progress’ and any measure to increase the voter’s confidence in the system should be welcomed.
During the hearing, Bhushan also cited a report published by Manorama Online about complaints of EVMs recording extra votes for BJP during mock polls conducted in the Kasargod constituency in Kerala.
The Bench asked the Commission to check this matter. At 2 pm today, the ECI official told the Supreme Court that the news report cited was totally ‘false’.
In order to understand the technical aspects of security features as well as to allay the apprehensions regarding EVMs, the Bench chose to interact with the ECI official, who was present in the Court.
Noting that this was an electoral process, which needed sanctity, the Apex Court observed that nobody should have the apprehension that something that was expected, was not being done.
The official told the Bench that about 17 lakh VVPAT machines were there. The manufacturer did not know which machine was going to which constituency and which button was allocated to which party. Further, there was no software loading in the VVPAT machine and it was a mere printer, he added.
Regarding the query as to why it took five hours to count VVPAT slips in an Assembly segment in a constituency, the official said that the VVPAT slips were not ‘actually meant’ for counting.
They were small, sticky papers (like those coming out of ATM machines). Hence, manual counting was a cumbersome process that took time.
The official said to count the VVPAT of one EVM, it took at least one hour. As such, it took at least five hours to complete the process as per the 2019 Supreme Court direction.
The official told the Bench that there has never been a mismatch between VVPAT slips and EVM votes ever.
The Bench then responded that if there has never been any mismatch, it spoke for itself.
Senior Advocate Maninder Singh, appearing for the ECI, termed the petitioners’ demand for a return to paper ballots a ‘retrograde’ step.
Asserting that EVMs were tamper-proof and beyond manipulation, the Senior Counsel said that human error cannot be ruled out in manual counting. He added that human participation has been minimised under the present system.
The Bench then observed that seven days before elections, in the presence of candidates, the Commission fed images in the flash memory of VVPAT. Once uploaded, it could not be changed because it was not connected to any computer or laptop.
Advocate on Record Prashant Bhushan raised the argument regarding non-transparent VVPAT screens.
The Bench told him that he was going ‘too far’. It said everything cannot be suspected. He was further told not to be critical of everything and appreciate if they (respondents) had done something good.
The Apex Court further said that it heard the AoR because it was also concerned about the situation.