The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a batch of petitions seeking mandatory cross-verification of the votes cast in Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) with Voter-Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips. However, a bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna asked the Election Commission of India to examine the suggestion if the VVPAT slips may have unique barcodes on them in addition to the party symbol, which in turn could be counted by an electronic machine. In his verdict, Justice Khanna passed two directions in the matter. First, all Symbol Loading Units (SLUs) will be sealed on or after May 1 on completion of the symbol loading process and will be kept in the strong room at least for 45 days post declaration of results. “The candidates or representatives shall sign the seal. The containers containing SLUs shall be kept in strong rooms, along with EVMs, at least for a period of 45 days post declaration of results. Second, the burnt memory semicontroller may be examined and verified by a team of engineers from EVM manufacturers after announcement of results on a written request made by candidates securing second and third highest votes. “All candidates or their representatives shall have the option to remain present at the time of verification. Such a request should be made within a period of 7 days from the date of the declaration of results. After the verification process is conducted, the actual cost or expenses for the said verification will be notified by the ECI and the candidates making the said request will make payment of said expenses. Expenses will be refunded in case EVM is found to be tampered,” the Supreme Court has ordered. Note that, a VVPAT is considered an independent verification system for voting machines, allowing voters to verify whether they have correctly cast their votes.
Published: Odishatv Bureau
Last updated: 26 April 2024, 02:19 PM IST
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