Lok Sabha polls: Why a former IAS officer and an advocate contestant calling EVMs undemocratic?

CNN Central News & Network–ITDC India Epress/ITDC News Bhopal: Is India, the largest democracy in the world, relying on a “flawed” and “undemocratic” system of elections using electronic voting machines (EVMs)?

While civil society groups are waiting to hear from the Supreme Court (hearing on April 16) on the petition seeking to cross-verify the electronic count (of votes) recorded in the EVMs with the print-out of the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips, a former bureaucrat and an advocate is questioning the sanctity and integrity of the EVMs in their unique ways.

While former IAS officer M.G. Devasahayam has approached the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC), after the ECI failed to respond to a memorandum (dated May 2, 2022) signed by 112 technocrats, academics, and senior civil servants, raising concerns over the integrity of the EVMs and fairness of the EVM-based elections in India; advocate Mehmood Pracha has taken the plunge into electoral politics to get the first-hand,  an insider view of the electoral system.

Citing the findings of the Citizens Commission of Elections’ report (January 2021), Devasahayam stated that EVM-VVPAT voting and counting does not comply with the essential democratic principle that each voter should be able to verify that her vote is cast and counted as intended, and the current system is not verifiable due to the absence of end to end verifiability.