| Syllabus: GS II, Subject: Polity, Topic: Elections and RPA, Issue: Election reforms |
Context: The Supreme Court hearing petitions seeking 100% cross-verification of the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips with the vote count.
Benefits of Electronic voting machine (EVM):
- Reduced booth capturing by limiting vote casting to four votes per minute.
- Eliminated invalid votes, making the counting process more efficient.
- Eco-friendly, reducing paper consumption in large-scale elections.
- Provide administrative convenience and faster, error-free counting.
- Mechanisms like random allocation and mock polls uphold integrity of the process.
- EVMs are standalone devices, not susceptible to external hacks.
Concerns:
- Doubts persist about EVMs’ susceptibility to hacking among political parties and activists.
- The current sample size for matching EVM count with VVPAT slips may not be scientifically robust, potentially failing to detect defective EVMs.
- Booth-wise polling behavior identification raises concerns about profiling and intimidation.
Measuresto enhance transparency and confidence in the election process:
- 100% use of VVPAT ensures voters can verify their votes.
- A scientific method for deciding the sample size for matching EVM count with VVPAT slips.
- If errors occur, VVPAT slips for the entire region should be counted for accuracy.
- “Totaliser” machines can aggregate votes from multiple EVMs for candidate-wise counts.
| +1 Advantage for mains (Best practices)
·         Many western democracies, including France, The Netherlands, and the U.S., have discontinued the use of EVMs for elections. ·         In Germany, the Supreme Court declared the use of EVMs in elections as unconstitutional in 2009. ·         Brazil is among the countries that continue to use EVMs for their elections. ·         Among neighboring countries, Pakistan does not use EVMs, while Bangladesh experimented with them in 2018 but reverted to paper ballots for the general elections in 2024. +1 Advantage for mains(Case law) ·         In Subramanian Swamy versus Election Commission of India (2013), the Supreme Court mandated a paper trail for ensuring free and fair elections. |
