Political parties rarely accept electoral defeat with any grace nor do they display magnanimity in victory. This time around in Uttar Pradesh, not only was grace missing, Mayawati ji of BSP also alleged that the EVMs (electronic voting machines) were tampered with to give BJP its massive victory. Arvind Kejriwal made the same allegation about Punjab, where the Congress won a handsome victory. Interestingly, the Congress party surrogates made the same argument for UP. The discourse is - "what is kosher when I win by a landslide is unfair when I lose by a landslide".
Allegations of rigging and tampering are endemic in post-election debates. I recall that when EVMs were introduced in the 1990s, the idea was precisely to curb malpractice and eliminate booth capture and ballot stuffing - what one long-standing ruling party in a state used to call "scientific booth management"!
The wheel has turned full circle and the same charges of rigging are being hurled widely at EVMs. Recently, the Delhi Congress chief, Ajay Maken, demanded that EVMs be replaced by paper ballot in the forthcoming Delhi municipal corporation elections in a letter to the Delhi election commissioner (referring to the election commissioner as "the elected chief minister of Delhi"). There is now much discussion on the demerits of EVMs. People refer to EVMs being discontinued in European countries and the US - and I am sure the abbreviation VVPAT (Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail) will soon find its way into practice questionnaires of IAS exam training shops. Oddly, if paper ballots replace EVMs, the same charges would be made against them - and perhaps with greater substance.
Classically, one would refer to a national leader's repeated failure at the hustings as a case of "electile dysfunction" - however more broadly the phrase can be construed as failure of the election results to satisfy the losing side. In times of political polarisation, this bitterness would eliminate prospects of constructive opposition and actually undermine public faith in elections. Therefore, it is important to have a series of confidence-building measures (CBMs) that build trust in the voting process.
The Election Commission has initiated CBMs with statements and interviews defending the EVMs and explaining how they ensure free and fair elections. They have described procedures such as mock poll before the actual voting and the VVPAT where the electronic vote leaves a paper trail that can be checked if there is any doubt regarding the veracity of the vote. VVPAT was introduced first in the US in 2001. Subsequently, it is required in the majority of US states - clearly the technology for a verified paper record has matured.
In India, VVPAT is under gradual implementation - it was used in one Assembly constituency in the Nagaland elections in 2013 and eight parliamentary constituencies in the 2014 national elections. In the recent Goa elections, VVPAT has been tried comprehensively, and in the UP elections it was piloted in select constituencies. We expect that with the required provision of funds, it will be rolled out in all constituencies - as of now 1.5 million booths would need to be covered.
Technology is not destiny, however. Indeed, the complexity of VVPAT implementation on scale, including the software and terminals, would face the challenge of "bots and back doors" - including the very wafers used for the electronic chip in the machines.
In a recent interview, the CEC commented that EVMs cannot be hacked. He would have been advised to add - "to the best of my knowledge". Any young person will tell you that in this age of cyberspace and "darknet", virtually any electronic device - air-gapped or not - can be accessed and tampered with. Indeed, as a leading cybersecurity guru has said - "Being hacked is the new normal!" If mission-critical centrifuges can be hacked to bring nuclear programmes to a halt and Sony Pictures can lose a billion dollars in value over the weekend on account of data hack, clearly it is time to step up totally the cybersecurity of India's elections and electoral processes. Election infrastructure must be considered for inclusion in the list of "critical information infrastructure".
The above transformation, however, would not be easy - VVPAT solutions require a certain level of capacity at the voting booth level - and in remote places and booths, the human resources would need to be stepped up - in UP can one say "beefed up"? The budgetary implications are substantial and political will would be needed for a solution that would paradoxically reduce the headroom for politicians to explain away resounding defeats.
Therefore, India requires the discussion on electoral reform to be sustained and focused not only on political finance and switch to proportional represen-tation, but also on more mundane but critical challenges of economy and efficiency in elections and electoral processes. All three sides - those who conduct elections, those who contest elections and those who vote - are stakeholders whose engagement must be continuous and evidence-based. Until then, elections in India would continue to be seen as a 100-metre dash instead of a continuous marathon of analysis, advocacy and action!
Suraj Kumar
Kumar is chief mentor of the Delhi-based Neeti Foundation. Views expressed are personal.
