VVPATs, e-votes to delay poll results

Sushil Manav
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, May 21

The Lok Sabha election results in all 10 parliamentary constituencies of Haryana, like other parts of the country, are expected to get delayed by a minimum of five hours on May 23 or may be delayed past midnight and go to May 24 morning due to VVPAT (voter-verified paper audit trail).

The results could be delayed further because of a large number of ETPBS (electronically transmitted postal ballot system) votes for the defence personnel in Rohtak and Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seats. Both these seats have over 10,000 ETPBS votes.

Dr Inder Jeet, Joint Chief Electoral Officer, Haryana, said that as the court increased the VVPAT count to five - instead of one - in every Assembly segment for the General Election, it is going to be a time-consuming process.

The VVPAT system, which is being used for the first time in a General Election, enables electronic voting machines or EVMs to record each vote by generating a slip.

“Counting of votes using one VVPAT takes about an hour. This means a minimum delay of five hours. But this is only if there is no discrepancy found. If some doubt surfaces, the counting through VVPAT could get further delayed,” he added.

Since all 10 Lok Sabha seats had 17 or more candidates, two EVMs were used on all seats leaving no scope for early results in any of the constituency. Dr Inder Jeet assured that the EVMs and VVPATs were perfect and there was no doubt that they were tamper-proof.

Notably, 21 Opposition parties had asked for counting of at least 25 per cent of the EVM paper trail machines, but during a hearing, the Election Commission had rejected the petition saying the results of the Lok Sabha election could be delayed by five days.

Later, the Supreme Court had told the ECI to increase the number of VVPAT machines from one to just five to avoid unnecessary delay.

Besides the counting of votes cast on EVMs, the votes of defence personnel cast through the ETPBS are also likely to consume time.

Nearly 1.05 lakh defence personnel were sent ETPBS and their votes will be separately counted by setting up one table against 500 votes in the counting centres.

How does VVPAT work?

• The Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) is a method of providing feedback to voters using a ballot-less voting system. The VVPAT is an independent printer system attached with electronic voting machine (EVM) that allows the voters to verify that their votes are cast as intended. 
• It generates a paper slip every time a voter casts his vote, recording the party to which the vote was given. The VVPAT slip is kept in a sealed cover. VVPAT slip counting takes place in the VVPAT counting booths under watch of the returning officer and the observer.
• When the voter casts the vote on the EVM, printer-like VVPAT apparatus linked to the EVM generates a slip showing name and symbol of the candidate to whom the vote was given. With this slip, the voter can verify his vote.
• The VVPAT slip is displayed for 7 seconds before it’s automatically cut. The slip, once viewed, is cut and dropped into the drop box in the VVPAT machine and a beep is heard. The votes revealed by the EVM can later be tallied with the VVPATs at the time of the counting. 

10,000 ETPBS votes in Rohtak, Bhiwani-M’garh 

The results could be delayed because of over 10,000 ETPBS (electronically transmitted postal ballot system) votes for the defence personnel in Rohtak and Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seats. Both these seats have .