Citizens' group calls for foolproof counting of votes

The Citizens Commission onElections (CCE), a civil society group of retired judges,former civil servants and activists, has called upon tbeElection Commission of India (ECI) to ensure foolproofcounting of votes.

The CCE released its first report on making proper andeffective tamper-proof use of EVMs at the Kolkata Press Clubon Saturday.

''With elections in the offing, voters confidence inthe electoral process needs to be secured and EVM votingshould abide by principles of democracy.

''Our technologists consulted best universities in theWest and both are alarmed at the present inadequacy of EVMs,more because elections are near in West Bengal, Assam,Kerala,'' the CCE said in a statement.

The public initiative is chaired by retired SupremeCourt judge Justice Madan Lokur. The eight-member committeecomprises former CIC Wajahat Habibullah, former Madras highcourt Judge Justice Hari Paranthaman, economist Arun Kumar,civil society activist John Dayal, senior journalist PamelaPhilipose, and Dr Subhashis Banerjee, professor of computerscience at IIT Delhi.

Former CEO of Prasar Bharati Jawahar Sircar, whopresented the report, told PTI on Sunday, the CCE is of theview that there should be full utilisation of Voter VerifiablePaper Audit Trail (VVPAT) so that there are zero anomaliesduring counting.

''The EC is yet to vet the use of VVPAT with every EVMin our polls. They are of the view that tallying the markedpaper slip with the electronic voting recorded in the machineprocessor chip will take lot of extra time. However, for eachmachine it will take less than half an hour extra time,''Sircar said.

The VVPAT is an independent printer like systemattached with the EVM that allows the voters to verify thattheir votes are cast as intended. The VVPAT consists of aPrinter and a VVPAT Status Display Unit (VSDU).

When a vote is cast, a slip is printed on the VVPATprinter containing the serial number, name and symbol of thecandidate for whom the voter has cast his ballot and it can beseen/verified by the voter for 7 seconds through a transparentwindow Thereafter, this printed slip automatically gets cutand falls in sealed drop box of the VVPAT.

Claiming that the EC's conduct of parliamentaryelections of 2019 had ''invited serious controversy and itsvery fairness came to be questioned by several organisationson very valid grounds,'' the organisers said seminars andwide-ranging public discussions were held on the issue in 2019and 2020.

''A unanimous suggestion that emanated from thisprocess was the need to constitute a body comprising eminentand experienced persons with domain knowledge to delve intocritical aspects related to elections in India,'' the statementsaid.

The CCE was constituted in March 2020, with themandate to draw upon expert advice, wherever necessary,and come up with appropriate suggestions to ensure thatelections in the country are conducted in a free and fairmanner.

Physical verification of VVPAT slips with the EVMcount was done across over 20,000 polling station beforedeclaration of Lok Sabha poll results in 2019, as per SupremeCourt orders.