EC gets ready for 'EVM challenge'

The Election Commission is all ready for a public test of its electronic voting machines (EVMs).

"We will announce the schedule for this challenge to EVMs tomorrow," an EC spokesman said today.

At an all-party meeting on May 12, Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi had said political parties had to demonstrate their claim that EVMs used in the recent assembly polls could have been tampered with.

In 2009, the Commission had held out a similar challenge when it demonstrated the functioning of EVMs brought in from various parts of the country to Vigyan Bhavan here.

The EC will also demonstrate the use of EVMs and paper trail machines at a media conference tomorrow.

At the all-party meet, most parties said EVMs could be used for future elections if they came with a paper trail machine, which would enable the electorate to check if their vote had been registered against the person of their choice.

Some parties, however, said the EVMs could not be trusted and the EC should revert to the old ballot paper system, where people inked their choices on a sheet of paper.