Supreme Court dismisses PIL seeking 100 pc VVPAT verification

A vacation bench of the apex court headed by Justice Arun Mishra, and comprising Justice MR Shah did not find any merit in the petition. "We dismiss the petition," Justice Mishra said

Supreme Court dismisses PIL seeking 100 pc VVPAT verification

Supreme Court

New Delhi: The Supreme Court dismissed a plea filed by a group of technocrats on Tuesday seeking a direction that all votes on Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) be verified with voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPATs). A vacation bench of the apex court headed by Justice Arun Mishra, and comprising Justice MR Shah did not find any merit in the petition. "We dismiss the petition," Justice Mishra said.

SC dismisses PIL seeking 100% matching of VVPAT slips with EVMs during counting of votes for #LokSabhaelections on Thursday.
— All India Radio News (@airnewsalerts) May 21, 2019

Former Chief Election Commissioners of India, Sri Navin Chawla & Sri S. Y. Quraishi also support the demands put forth by us regarding VVPAT verification.

Those who respect democracy are disappointed with how the EC conducted elections. Our fight to save democracy will continue.
— N Chandrababu Naidu (@ncbn) May 20, 2019

"We would not entertain such kind of plea over and over again. We cannot come in the way of people electing their representatives," Justice Mishra said while dismissing the petition. Coming down heavily on the petitioners, Justice Mishra termed the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) "nuisance".

When a former CEC raises questions about the unusual movement of EVMs, you know we should be worried. That is why it is important to count the VVPAT paper slips as well https://t.co/e8gU0XLOde
— Prashant Bhushan (@pbhushan1) May 21, 2019

The EC’s affidavit does not mention two reported incidents of mismatches in the EVM-VVPAT tallies. Instead, it states, “No mismatch has been detected in mock polls or in verification of VVPAT slips carried out at 1500 polling stations till date.” https://t.co/7BPB5jGrUO
— The Caravan (@thecaravanindia) May 20, 2019

Apart from their demand to increase VVPAT verification to 100 per cent, the petitioners also demanded replacement of EVMs with optical ballot scan machines for future elections. "As technocrats, we submit that in the long term the EVM should be replaced by optical ballot scan machine which upholds the tangible secret ballot system, verifiable even by a common man coupled with cost-effectiveness," the petition said.

On VVPATs & the EVM tally, the EC is yet to come out with a procedure in case there is a mismatch! Even if there is one mismatch in the VVPAT samples picked for counting and EVMs, to maintain integrity of the electoral process, all VVPATs in that assembly segment must be counted
— Sitaram Yechury (@SitaramYechury) May 20, 2019

It's not just #EVMHacking did u know: the VVPAT slip belongs to machine A or B can't be told by the common man. Each EVM has a number, why can't it print out the slip with that number?
Can EC tell us where are the previous VVPAT slips?
Ink on the VVPAT dries!!
— Tehseen Poonawalla (@tehseenp) May 21, 2019

Why not a single voter complained about mismatching in casted vote and Printed slip in VVPAT ? All EVM hacking claims are rubbish perhaps easy excuse of defeaters..Trust ECI ..they are doing good jobs in transparent manner @ECISVEEP #EVMHacking #ITrustECI
— Harshit (@TweeTopper) May 21, 2019

Optical scan voting machine allows a voter to manually mark their vote on a paper ballot which is scanned for electronic tabulation. On May 7, twenty-one Opposition parties urged the Election Commissioner to match at least 50 per cent electronic voting machines with VVPAs after their petition of the same effect was rejected by the top court. Current provisions say five randomly-selected EVMs will be verified in each assembly segment with the VVPAT slips.