Electronic Voting Machines are absolutely tamper proof and technically it was not possible to hack into into them because care is taken at every stage to adhere to the highest quality standards before it goes into production, asserted Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission and Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy Sekhar Basu here on Thursday.
“We have standard procedures in place and the EVM has adequate security features, more than required so that they cannot be manipulated to influence poll results. In-built diagnosis can detect any tampering. We have a dedicated set up to manufacture them. Once done, we hand them over to the Election Commission of India (ECI) who have their own elaborate procedures to safeguard,” he explained.
Dr. Basu was addressing a press conference at the Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) facility in the presence of its CMD Debashis Das and other directors.
ECIL Golden Jubilee
He was in the city to participate in the Golden Jubilee celebrations of the institute which had designed and makes EVMs in association with Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL).
Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPATs) machines too was conceived by the ECIL to give “extra confidence to the voter” as it gives a slip indicating the party symbol, name and serial number to which the vote was cast in a separate box. He pointed out these machines were used in 1:3 ratio in last General Elections.
The Election Commission had already issued a letter of intent for making four lakh new EVMs and little more than eight lakh VVPATs (BEL to make other eight lakh) at an overall cost of ₹2100 crore. A new assembly line facility of 60,000 sq.metres has been set up within the campus for making the machines and about 1200 staff are to be employed in three shifts to make the machines ready for the General Elections, said Dr. Das.
Increased capacity
Capacity to make electronic circuit boards was enhanced to 3.5 lakh components an hour from one lakh. Having made more than 10 lakh EVMs in the last two decades, the public sector unit has also received orders for supply of EVMs from countries like Bulgaria and Ivory Coast. EVMs and VVPATs have a shelf life of 15 years and are destroyed with stringent security detail.
The 2,500 employee strong ECIL, with a turnover of ₹1500 crore last year and likely to be ₹1700 crore in 2017-18, was set up in 1967 by Department of Atomic Energy under A.S. Rao, who headed the electronics division of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC).
Although it did foray into consumer electronics like EC TV, its focus has been in making critical electronic components of high value use in strategic fields of security systems, defence, atomic energy and space research. “Its mandate is to make components not available elsewhere and profits not the sole concern,” said Dr. Basu.
Exclusive equipment
With expertise in systems of X-ray baggage, satellite communication, hybrid micro-circuits, thermal batteries, data processing systems for banking, control instrumentation for nuclear plants, missile support, radiological detectors in all ports and jammers, it now is making forays into medical equipment.
It is also building a 21-metre telescope for Gamma Ray astronomy in Ladakh, 4000 metres above sea level after having done the 32 metres deep space network antenna for Chandrayan – moon mission and also for Mangalyan – Mars Orbiter Mission, said Dr. Das.
