New Delhi: A review petition has been moved in the Supreme Court, against the judgment in the EVM-VVPAT case where a direction for 100% cross-verification of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) data with Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) records was declined.
The petition, filed by a Karnataka resident Arun Kumar Agrawal, said that there were mistakes and errors apparent on the face of the order, dated April 26, 2024, and there are sufficient reasons which require review of the apex court judgment.
The review petition, filed though advocate Neha Rathi, said: "The petitioner respectfully seeks review on the following issues as have been dealt with in judgment: i) Feasibility of counting of all VVPAT paper slips in terms of time to be taken and additional manpower ii) Vulnerability of SLU iii) Percentage of VVPAT slips counted for tallying with EVM votes after Chandrababu Naidu (2019)".
The plea contended that VVPAT paper is of the same size as the thermal printout received when a credit/ debit card is swiped on making a payment.
"The counting of the slips after they have been sorted candidate-wise, is in fact easier than counting normal paper because the VVPAT paper slip is slightly curled on account of being thermally printed from a roll", it contended.
The plea contended that the curling makes the picking up of the paper slip from the surface of a table easy and each slip can be counted while being picked to make bundles of 25 slips (as mandated under instructions given in the Election Commission of India's Manual on EVM and VVPAT, 2023).
The plea also contested a determination in the ruling that the 100 per cent matching of EVM-VVPAT data would cause a delay in the poll results being declared.
The petitioner submitted that if the same number of tables is utilised for counting of the VVPAT slips under the existing CCTV surveillance system, the entire counting of an average of 250 booths can be done within 5-8 hours with the additional manpower of (28 x 4) 108 persons per assembly segment.
"Thus, it is not correct to state that the result will be unreasonably delayed, or the manpower required will be double of that already deployed. Furthermore, the existing CCTV surveillance of counting halls would ensure that manipulation and mischief does not occur in VVPAT slip counting," said the plea.
"It is respectfully submitted that the entire discussion on the SLU ignores the fact that SLU is vulnerable and needs to be audited. This Hon’ble Court completely overlooked the possibility that the data in the SLU can have extra bytes other than just the necessary images," added the plea.
The petition, citing the apex court judgment, said that presently 5 per cent of the VVPAT paper slips are tallied with votes cast. "It is respectfully submitted that the said figure is factually incorrect and in fact, less than 2 per cent of the VVPAT slips are counted for verification of EVMs," it said.
On April 25, the apex court rejected a bunch of petitions demanding 100 per cent cross-verification of votes cast on EVMs with VVPATs, emphasising the simplicity, security and user-friendliness of EVMs. The judges consider a review petition in their chambers, without oral arguments.
