- Saturday, April 12, 2025
He said over fifty million VVPAT (voter-variable paper audit trail) slips have been counted and no discrepancies have been reported so far
By: India Weekly
CHIEF ELECTION COMMISSIONER Gyanesh Kumar on Saturday said the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) are “safe” and “tamper-proof”.
He said that EVMs used in India cannot be connected to internet, bluetooth or infrared and it is not possible anyway to tamper with it.
“In India, EVMs are used for polling exercise. Legal scrutiny has been done on EVMs. The EVMs used in India can neither be connected to internet nor bluetooth nor infrared. The EVMs cannot be connected to anything in any way. Therefore, it is not possible to tamper with it. So, India’s EVMs are tamper-proof,” Kumar said addressing media persons in Jharkhand’s Ramgarh district.
He said over fifty million VVPAT (voter-variable paper audit trail) slips have been counted and no discrepancies have been reported so far.
Kumar arrived in Ranchi on Friday evening on a three-day visit to Jharkhand. The CECon Saturday interacted with election officials in Ramgarh.
“I interacted with returning officers and volunteers here. After meeting them, I felt that there is a strong foundation of democracy in Jharkhand,” he said.
He said every citizen of India, who has completed 18 years of age, must become an elector.
Kumar added no appeal (related to EPIC cards) is pending either with district election officer or chief electoral officer (CEO), which means the voter list in Jharkhand is close to 100 per cent satisfactory for voters and others.
The issue attained significance after United States director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard claimed that her office has obtained evidence of vulnerabilities to the hacking of electronic voting systems in the US for manipulating votes and called for a nationwide switch to paper ballots.
During a Cabinet meeting convened by US President Donald Trump on April 10, Gabbard said that the Intelligence department has “evidence” that EVS are susceptible to the exploitation to manipulate the results” of votes cast and advocated for paper ballot-based elections.
Probe demanded
Senior Congress leader Randeep Surjewala on Friday (11) demanded that the Supreme Court should take suo-motu notice of the issue and announce a probe.
In a post on X, the Congress general secretary said Gabbard has publicly raised the “issues of hacking” of electronic voting machines (EVMs) and their vulnerabilities.
“In fact, she further said that EVMs are … vulnerable to exploitation to manipulate the results of the votes being cast. The question is: Why are CEC and Election Commission of India ‘silent’? Why is ECI planting ‘source based stories’ to negate what Ms Tulsi Gabbard said? Why are the PM, NDA government and BJP ‘mum’?” he asked.
Surjewala said the EC and the Centre should reach out to the US government and Gabbard to collect all the details of hacking and other vulnerabilities of EVMs.
“Is it fair and just to outrightly rubbish and reject the statement made by the Director of National Intelligence of the US, whom we felicitated recently?
“Should the Supreme Court of India not take suo motu notice of the issue and conduct a thorough investigation, considering that free and fair elections and democracy are part of the ‘basic structure’ of the Constitution?” the Congress leader asked. (PTI)
