The Election Commission’s statement — a sheepish one — that an ‘increase in VVPAT numbers will delay counting by six days’ (Page 1, March 30) says many things.
In fact, Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) with Voter Verified Paper Trail Audits (VVPATs) were implemented to remove the concerns and the perception that EVMs are vulnerable to tampering. For some reason, the Election Commission (EC) has not been very keen on having a paper trail. Counting VVPATs has always been a difficult and time-consuming proposition. Therefore, if the trails couldn’t be counted to the extent demanded, what else was the purpose of having such paper audit trails? For many years, paper ballots remained a trustworthy mechanism, and helped in the declaration of accurate results within stipulated time schedules. A decade ago, the Federal Constitutional Court in Germany had said that the use of voting machines which electronically record votes and also electronically ascertain election results only meet constitutional requirements. Some of the western countries have paper ballots. It would be short-sighted of the EC not to take note of these developments.
Haridasan Rajan,
Kozhikode, Kerala
The EC should have given greater and more thought to voter acceptability in its submission than harping on how counting time would be increased by six days, admittedly a drawback. To engage more personnel for verification of paper slips could be thought of. An additional six days is nothing in the nearly three-month-long election festival. The voter needs to be thoroughly sure and convinced of his choice.
P.R.V. Raja,
Pandalam, Kerala