Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Feb 11: The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Election Commission of India (ECI) about the Standard Operating Procedure for Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) after polls are over and directed it neither to delete any data from EVM nor reload any data,
The query was raised in response to a petition which sought that data from EVMs should not be deleted even after the counting of votes is over. The court clarified that checking and verifying the burnt memory of microcontrollers of electronic voting machines (EVMs) for signs of tampering does not envisage the erasing or reloading of data in the machines.
“Do not erase the data. Do not reload the data. All we directed was for an engineer to come and certify, in the presence of the applicant-candidates, that the microchip has not been tampered with,” Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna, heading a Special Bench with Justice Dipankar Datta, told the ECI represented by senior advocate Maninder Singh.
The Election Commission has to provide information to the court about the process of burning EVM memory and microcontroller after elections. “This is not adversarial,” said the Chief Justice. “If the losing candidate wants clarification, the engineer can give clarification that there has been no tampering,” he added.
The top court was told that engineers of Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) had loaded dummy symbol and data in the EVMs and data of the original machine was cleared. The CJI Khanna questioned the poll body why the data was cleared and ordered that it ensure that EVM data is not deleted.
The court’s comments came while it was hearing a petition by the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR), Haryana, and a group of Congress leaders. The petitions sought that the court directs the Commission to formulate policy for checking original burnt memory/microcontroller of EVM components. The petition has also demanded that the burnt memory and microcontroller of EVM be verified by engineers to prove that EVM has not been tampered with.
Petitioners represented by senior advocate Devadutt Kamat and advocate Prashant Bhushan said checking or verification of EVMs was being done like a “mock poll.” The petitions were off-shoot of a judgment pronounced on April 26 last year in which the Bench had upheld the EVM system of polling while refusing a plea to revive paper ballots.
In a separate direction, the top court had directed that the burnt memory of microcontrollers of five percent of EVMs, which includes that of control units, ballot units, VVPATs, in every assembly segment of a parliamentary constituency can be checked and verified by a team of engineers of the EVM manufacturers in case of any suspicion of tampering.
The exercise would be initiated on a written request from candidates who come second or third in the victor’s tally, the judgment had said. The applicants would identify the EVM to be verified or the polling station. The application for verification should be sent within seven days of the declaration of the election results.
The District Election Officer concerned, in consultation with the team of engineers, should verify the authenticity or intactness of the burnt memory of the microcontrollers of the EVMs verified, the April judgment had directed. The expenses of the verification would be undertaken by the applicant candidates or their representatives. They would be refunded in case the EVMs are found tampered, the court had directed.
Mr Singh argued that the petitions were not maintainable and some of the petitioners were in the third round of litigation on the same issue since the pronouncement of the judgment. The court listed the case in the week commencing on March 3, 2025. It asked the ECI to file a short affidavit with its response on the issue raised by the petitioners.
