Raising questions over the legitimacy of EVMs used during the recently held Lok Sabha election, several activists and student leaders on Thursday came forward on behalf of the EVM Virodhi Rashtriya Jan Andolan and demanded the use of ballot papers for the upcoming elections to “restore democracy”.
‘National consensus’
St. Stephens College Professor Nandita Narain said, “No powerful party can bulldoze over the voices of the citizens. Whatever method of election is used should be based on national consensus. What is the point of having VVPATs if 100% counting was not done? Voices have been raised against the use of EVMs for a very long time now and it is important that we go back to the ballot paper system to ensure transparency.”
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Referring to an RTI response, activists said that the chips present in EVMs were reprogrammable which indicated the possibility of EVM tampering.
JNU Students’ Union president N. Sai Balaji said, “The Election Commission of India had maintained that the chips used in EVMs are one-time programmable ones. However, an RTI response shows that the chip comes with a flash memory which is indicative of the fact that the chips are rewritable. Why is the ECI not responding to this particular aspect?”
Adding that all machines can be tampered with, activist and filmmaker Gauhar Raza said, “Technically, it cannot be the case that EVMs cannot be tampered with as all machines are tamperable. This is no longer a technical issue but a political one and citizens should raise their voices against it. We will take the voices of people to the political parties.”
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An open letter to all parties was also released that appealed for recognition of the “threats posed by manipulation of EVMs”.
“We appeal to urge you to initiate immediate measures for public awareness regarding possible manipulation by EVM. We also request you to move forward to reject EVM and revert to paper ballot and if necessary to boycott elections to press forward this demand,” read the letter to the political parties.
Activist Shabnam Hashmi said, “The 2019 election were won simply using [manipulating] the EVMs. We do not want EVMs to be used for any of the upcoming Assembly elections. It is important that our democracy is safeguarded.”