Prove EVMs can't be hacked, activists tell EC

Questioning the "reliability" of EVMs, activists Tehseen Poonawalla and V.V. Rao on Wednesday asked the Election Commission to prove in front of experts that the machines cannot be tampered with.

Poonawalla told reporters here that the total votes polled and counted during the February's Pune civic polls in 41 of the 160 wards did not tally.

"If there is a discrepancy in the number of votes polled and counted, then we surely have a problem," he said, adding that using Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) alone will not ensure transparency in the poll process.

Poonawalla urged the Election Commission to tally the EVMs and the VVPAT votes in 50 per cent of the constituencies in future elections.

The Aam Aadmi Party-dominated Delhi assembly had on Tuesday passed a resolution asking for tallying of votes in 25 per cent randomly-selected polling booths.

Activist V.V. Rao asked why the Election Commission had not invited technical experts and those who had moved the Supreme Court to challenge the reliability of EVMs to an all-party meeting convened on May 12 by the poll watchdog.

He said it had already been proven in 2010 that EVMs could be tampered with, which led to the use of VVPATs.

"Then why is the Election Commission challenging the theory of EVM-hacking?" he asked.

--IANS

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