Supreme Court to Hear Petition to Stop Fraudulent Use of EVMs in Elections
Supreme Court to Hear Petition to Stop Fraudulent Use of EVMs in Elections
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has been ignoring the constant complaints of the opposition parties and research findings about the vulnerability of EVMs to persist with these insecure machines.
By Rakesh Raman
The Supreme Court of India has willy-nilly admitted a petition to check the fraudulent use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in Indian elections.
According to a report of July 17 in The Hindu newspaper, the court has asked petitioner NGO, Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), to provide a copy of the petition to the Election Commission of India (ECI).
The petition, filed through advocate Prashant Bhushan, seeks a direction to cross-verify the vote count in EVMs with votes separately “recorded as cast” in the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT).
Since the Supreme Court judges do not fully understand the technicalities of EVMs, according to reports, a Bench led by Justice Sanjiv Khanna made a random verbal remark that the petitioner may be “over-suspicious”. However, reportedly the top court agreed to list the EVM case after three weeks.
Earlier, without getting the EVM issue thoroughly investigated, the Supreme Court has been arbitrarily dismissing the petitions that sought to hold elections transparently by stopping the deceptive use of EVMs.
Since most Supreme Court judges lack domain knowledge, they take casual decisions which cannot be challenged. The situation is worse in the high courts and lower courts.
If you evaluate the Supreme Court judgments through an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based expert system, you will find that almost all the judgments, dismissal of petitions, or delays in decisions are either wrong or biased.
“The SC (Supreme Court) today asked petitioner NGO, ADR, to serve the CEC with a copy of their petition seeking a direction to cross-verify the vote count in Electronic Voting Machines with votes separately “recorded as cast” in VVPATs. A very important petition for our democracy,” advocate Prashant Bhushan tweeted on July 17.
The SC today asked petitioner NGO, ADR, to serve the CEC with a copy of their petition seeking a direction to cross-verify the vote count in Electronic Voting Machines with votes separately “recorded as cast” in VVPATs.
A very imp petition for our democracy…— Prashant Bhushan (@pbhushan1) July 17, 2023
EVM VULNERABILITY
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has been ignoring the constant complaints of the opposition parties and research findings about the vulnerability of EVMs to persist with these insecure machines.
In December 2022, the ECI even announced plans to expand the use of EVMs in Indian elections by introducing a new Multi-Constituency Remote Electronic Voting Machine (RVM).
The opposition parties complain that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of prime minister (PM) Narendra Modi colludes with the ECI to manipulate EVMs and win elections deceptively.
But the ECI – which is completely controlled by the Modi government – ignores the opposition complaints and holds elections on EVMs and mostly BJP wins. And the defeated opposition parties silently accept the election results and wait for the next elections.
[ Video: चुनाव में ईवीएम के फर्जी इस्तेमाल को रोकने के लिए दायर याचिका पर सुनवाई करेगा सुप्रीम कोर्ट ]
As the doubts about the fraudulent use of EVMs have been increasing, ChatGPT (or Generative Pre-trained Transformer) – which is an artificial intelligence or AI-based online tool – confirms that there are several ways in which EVMs can be hacked and manipulated.
OPPOSITION COMPLAINTS
The opposition party Congress complained about the EVM frauds even in the recent elections. When Congress was defeated by the BJP in the Gujarat election in December 2022, a Congress leader Digvijay Singh blamed the fraudulent use of EVMs. But he did not reveal any plan to stop the EVM manipulation.
Simultaneously, a Congress spokesman Pawan Khera held a comprehensive briefing to explain how EVMs were manipulated by the BJP of PM Modi to win the Gujarat election. But he too did not discuss any specific strategy to combat the alleged EVM fraud by BJP in elections.
Congress complains that EVMs are not safe even when used with the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) option. It is also observed that when EVMs malfunction, they vote only in favor of Modi’s BJP which runs with Lotus election symbol.
Obviously, BJP and PM Modi will always oppose paper ballots and any investigation into the misuse of EVMs. And it goes without saying that the Election Commission – which is a toothless outfit – will always obey Modi.
However, top tech experts believe that it is very easy to tamper with EVMs in India and change the election results fraudulently in favor of certain candidates.
FRAUDULENT USE OF EVMs
In their study on EVMs in India, security researchers from India, the United States, and the Netherlands argue that “contrary to claims by Indian election authorities, these paperless electronic voting systems suffer from significant vulnerabilities.”
The researchers also have found that even brief access to the machines could allow dishonest election insiders or other criminals to alter election results. They have developed a video to demonstrate their claims.
Tech experts observe that besides other manipulations, the chip used in the EVMs is not of the OTP (One Time Programmable) category. That means, it can be programmed in each EVM to change the vote count in favor of a particular candidate.
Since opposition parties have been raising the EVM vulnerability issues repeatedly, now it is believed that the BJP manipulates EVMs in some crucial state elections and Lok Sabha elections in which Modi himself contests.
While most politicians in opposition parties are illiterate, they cannot fully understand the manipulation that can be done with the EVMs. Therefore, after some weak verbal protests, they accept EVM election results in which mostly BJP wins.
Now, with the possible introduction of new EVMs that the ECI has proposed, it will become extremely difficult for opposition parties to win elections and prove the vulnerability of the new machines.
If the opposition parties really want to stop the use of EVMs, they should hold street protests against the ECI in front of the ECI office and the state election commission offices.
As the ECI will again ignore the demands to discard EVMs and use paper ballots in elections, the opposition parties should boycott the future elections – including the Lok Sabha election 2024 – instead of complaining about EVMs after every election defeat.
Since the Supreme Court judges and election authorities do not take any decision that may displease their boss PM Modi, it is unlikely that the EVM issue will be resolved. Thus, EVMs will continue to be used in elections – particularly the Lok Sabha election 2024 – in a deceptive manner to help BJP win.
By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. He is the founder of the humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society. He has also launched the “Power Play: Lok Sabha Election 2024 in India” editorial section to cover the news, events, and other developments related to the 2024 election.
