NEW DELHI: Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal said he has prepared a checklist with details of administrative unit numbers, polling unit numbers and VVPAT IDs to assist all political parties and their vote counting agents on the day of counting of votes.
Sibal said there was talk that the EVM machines may have been tampered with and he wanted to ensure that this was not the case.
“Any machine can be tampered with. I’m not saying there is no trust. But unless voters can be sure that their vote was counted for that candidate… we have allowed this just for this reason,” Sibal said.
Sibal said that first the administrative unit number, polling unit number and VVPAT ID need to be matched.
“The time when the machine will be opened is written in the queue. If there is any difference in this time, it will indicate that the machine has already been opened somewhere… The serial numbers of the control units can also be cross-checked between the parties involved,” Sibal said.
He added that there is a problem if the date in the “Voting Results” section that appears after pressing the “Results” button on the control unit is different from the date of the vote.Furthermore, the serial number of the CU must match both before and after pressing the “Results” button.
“The total number of votes displayed after pressing the ‘Results’ button should also match the number mentioned in Form 17C, Part I,” he added.
In the voting process, the control unit is located at the polling station and the voting unit is the machine where the vote is cast. During the voting process, the polling officer presses the “Vote” button for each vote. Seven seconds after pressing the vote button at the voting unit, a beep sounds and the VVPAT ballot paper will display the symbol of the political party for which you are voting. There have been complaints of a different political party appearing on the ballot paper.
Published May 26, 2024 17:19 IST
