BJP Criticizes Elon Musk's Call to Eliminate EVMs

The BJP has rebuked Elon Musk for suggesting the elimination of electronic voting machines (EVMs), asserting that his concerns about hacking risks do not apply to India's secure, custom-designed EVMs. The BJP emphasized that Indian EVMs are isolated from networks, and suggested that Musk could benefit from a tutorial on their security features.

In a sharp rebuttal, the BJP has denounced billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s recent suggestion to abolish electronic voting machines (EVMs). The party argues that Musk’s apprehensions about hacking are unfounded in the Indian context, where EVMs are specially designed to be secure and isolated from any form of connectivity.

Elon Musk, in a post on X, claimed, “We should eliminate electronic voting machines. The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high.” BJP leader Rajeev Chandrasekhar, responding firmly, countered, “This is a huge sweeping generalization statement that implies no one can build secure digital hardware. Wrong. Elon Musk's view may apply to the US and other places - where they use regular compute platforms to build Internet connected Voting machines.”

Highlighting the robustness of Indian EVMs, Chandrasekhar explained, “Indian EVMs are custom designed, secure and isolated from any network or media - No connectivity, no bluetooth, wifi, Internet. ie there is no way in. Factory programmed controllers that cannot be reprogrammed.” He added that India would gladly provide a tutorial to Musk on their secure architecture.

Additionally, BJP's IT department head Amit Malviya invited Musk or anyone else with hacking claims to approach the Election Commission of India and prove it. Malviya also criticized Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for leveraging Musk's comments to question the integrity of India’s electoral process, saying, “But why is Rahul Gandhi complaining about Indian democracy to Musk? What can Musk do? Or is crying before the world and demeaning India part of Congress's DNA? We just had an election and people of India rejected this dynast for a third time in row. But he still does not get it.”