On Tuesday (16th April), the Supreme Court heard pleas seeking cross-verification of the votes cast with Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT). While the Supreme Court bench comprising Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta was not convinced by advocate Prashant Bhushan’s arguments to go back to election via ballot paper instead of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), CNBC TV18 published a misleading report claiming that the SC bench said that “we can go back to ballot paper or give VVPAT slip to the voters.
A CNBC report (archive) claimed that Justice Sanjiv Khanna suggested during the hearing that since the “VVPAT box switched from transparent to fleetingly transparent, ballot paper may be a better option.”
The CNBC report even quoted Justice Sanjiv Khanna as saying, “We can go back to paper ballots. Another option is to give the VVPAT slip to the voters in hand. Otherwise, the slip falls into the machine and the slip can be then given to the voter and it can be put into the ballot box. Then the VVPAT design was changed, it had to be transparent glass, but it was changed to dark opaque mirror glass where it is only visible when the light is on for seven seconds.”
Contrary to the CNBC report’s claim, it was not Justice Khanna but advocate Prashant Bhushan who said this during the hearing. Bhushan said this when Justice Khanna asked him, “What relief are you seeking?”
To this, advocate Prashant Bhushan said, “In 2017 they designed the VVPAT machines different from what they used to be. The machine should have a transparent glass. In 2017 it was changed to dark opaque mirrored glass, where you can’t see unless a light is lit inside the box, you can’t even see the slip cut and go inside the box. suppose you put a program that if two consecutive votes are cast for the same person then the slip won’t be cut.”
In response, Justice Khanna asked: “We have understood. What do you want?”
It is in response to Justice Khanna’s question that Prashant Bhushan proposed three options before the court. He said that one option is to return to the ballot paper voting system, giving VVPAT slips to the voter or placing the transparent glass on VVPAT machines. He suggested a fourth option that if the voter doubts something is not right, he may file a complaint under 177.
“We can make the glass transparent. There are three options. Ballot paper, give VVPAT slip to voter and third is transparent glass. There is a fourth option. If the voter feels something is not right, they can file a complaint under 177,” Bhushan said.
It is, thus, clear that it was not Justice Sanjiv Khanna who opined that paper ballot may be a better system or that VVPAT slips be given to voters but advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) who proposed these as options to ensure fair elections.
While CNBC’s factually incorrect report claims that Justice Khanna saw ballot paper as a better option “maybe”, the Supreme Court bench was not convinced by the petitioner’s argument to return to the ballot paper.
“We are in our 60s. We all know what happened when there were ballot papers; you may have, but we have not forgotten,” Justice Khanna said.
Moreover, he also said that human intervention in the polling and counting process could lead to further problems and biases. “Normally, human interventions lead to problems and human weakness can be there which includes biases as well. Machines, normally without human intervention, will give you accurate results. Yes, the problem arises when there is human intervention or someone makes unauthorised changes when they are around the software or machine. If you have any suggestions to avert this, then you can give us that,” Justice Khanna said.