New Delhi: Rejecting the demand of major opposition parties, the Election Commission yesterday ruled out going back to the era of ballot papers and asserted it cannot be “bullied or coerced” into discarding the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and VVPATs.
“We are going to keep on using EVMs. We are going to keep on using VVPATs (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail). We are open to any kind of criticism and feedback from any stakeholder, including the political parties. They are the biggest stakeholders.
“But at the same time, we are not going to be intimidated or bullied or pressurised or coerced into now giving up these and start the era of ballot boxes,” Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said while inaugurating an international conference here on “Making Our Elections Inclusive and Accessible”.
“I would like to again make it very clear that we are not going back to the era of ballot papers. We are not going back to that era where we have ballot papers being lifted, muscle men being employed, besides the delay in counting and also too much harassment of polling staff on the ground,” he said.
Questioning political parties on why they embrace the EVMs if the result is favourable to them and crying foul if it is against, he asked why they were turning the issue of EVMs into a “motivated slugfest”.
“My simple question is that if the result is ‘X’, (they say) EVMs are right; and if the result turns out to be ‘Y’, EVMs are faulty. Why have we made a machine, that too manufactured under highly secured conditions by the two PSUs who are doing a lot of work for defence establishments of our country?
“Why have we made it like football and are doing a motivated slugfest over it,” he told political parties which have been raising doubts over the EVMs.
The Chief Election Commissioner’s remarks come amid demands from several opposition parties to scrap the EVMs and a return to ballot papers.
