Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) developed in late nineties were once considered to be the failsafe tools to win the fight against organized booth capturing and vote rigging that used to mar the electoral process in the country. As governments in the past gradually switched over to these machines for electing the people’s representatives, a relatively new issue has struck the political circles about the reliability and transparency of these automated press button devices to select candidates in the Parliamentary as well as Assembly elections.
In this context, the Union Minister has reportedly attacked the Congress for raising a question on the reliability of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) after the oldest party’s debacle in Maharashtra saying there is no issue for its leadership when the party wins the elections. The consistency of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) has remained a big issue for many years, especially after poll outcomes that are not in favour of certain political parties.
The issue usually comes to fore after unfavourable results of the opposition parties, that start questioning about the reliability of these voting machines. What is to be seen in this context is not about which party has faced a defeat in elections or which remained triumphant but the big question is about the integrity of EVMs that whether these could ever be compromised.
As the matter is of grave concern because the interest of all countrymen is involved therefore there is a need to go through it with complete transparency and candor, without questioning the intent because whichever process is being used in the country to elect public representatives should of 100 per cent integrity and not the one having credibility issues.
Although the Election Commission of India has supporting the use of EVMs claiming these to tamper-proof but there are still valid concerns from various quarters about their vulnerability to manipulation, especially in terms of their software and hardware security. If the integrity of these machines is unreliable, it becomes crucial for all stakeholders to revisit the decision of giving such unquestionable support to an electoral system which has its own limitations as far as chances of tampering are concerned. If there exists any possibility, even a remote one, that EVMs could be tampered with or manipulated, the electorate’s trust in the electoral process is bound to be dented.
It is therefore necessary to address the aforesaid concerns without any ifs and buts and assess the technology thoroughly, and ensure that no entity can manipulate the machines to deceive the people of India.
