SC order takes note of EC submissions on VVPAT slips

The Supreme Court Monday took note of the EC's submission that sample verification of VVPAT paper trail of one EVM is done by a team of three officers under the direct supervision of returning officer and the election observer of the constituency.

"The process takes about an hour. If what the petitioner asks for i.e. verification of VVPAT paper trail of 50 per cent of the EVMs, the declaration of result of election could be delayed by by 5-6 days," the Election Commission (EC) told the top court.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi also noted in its order that the EC has "not responded very favourably" to the prayers made in the petition filed by 21 opposition leaders through senior advocate A M Singhvi who contended that the thrust of their plea is to maintain purity of electoral process and to ensure foolproof result of mandate expressed by the voters in the upcoming polls.

The Supreme Court Monday directed the EC to increase the random matching of paper trail machine slips with EVM results from one to five polling booths in each assembly segment for the multi-phase Lok Sabha polls starting Thursday, holding this will bring more "credibility" and "integrity" to the electoral process.

It took on record the submissions of EC by saying that the poll panel, very broadly, contends that a query had been posed to the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) as to "what would be the reasonable sample size of polling stations where VVPAT slips verification is required to be carried out to achieve the object of establishing the credibility and integrity of the electoral process".

It noted, "According to the ECI, the said query was posed to an Expert Body, namely, ISI. In response, the ISI had submitted an elaborate report, the crux of which is that verification of VVPAT paper trail of 479 (randomly selected) Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) would generate over 99 per cent accuracy in the election results."