Supreme Court has dismissed a petition seeking review of its judgement rejecting plea for 100 per cent verification of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) votes with their Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips.
The latest statement of the Congress leader came a day after he called EVMs a ‘black box’ in India that cannot be scrutinised, in the wake of a media report claiming EVM hacking at Mumbai North West parliamentary constituency in the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls.
He said the goal is to leave no one behind and let everyone fully participate in the electoral process.
Despite the commission's lofty claims, the Election Commission of Pakistan's (ECP) new Election Management System (EMS) failed, he said.
"Elections through ballot paper are necessary to restore the faith in democracy,” said the Samajwadi Party president.
The Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) are in the news yet again for developing glitches in the state as informed by the Chief Election Officer of Andhra Pradesh where more than 350 EVMs have broken down.
The Supreme Court on Monday directed the poll body to increase VVPAT verification from one EVM per constituency to five randomly selected EVMs in the upcoming General Elections.
The Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) and postal ballot papers would for the first time carry the photograph of all the candidates to help voters identify the political leaders in the fray.
EVMs were first used at 50 polling stations in a by-poll at the Parur Assembly constituency in Kerala in May 1982.
In the plea, the opposition requested the court that 50 per cent of results of EVMs must be matched and cross-checked with VVPATs before the declaration of results in the general elections.
