SC directs ECI to not delete data from EVMs and cut Rs 40,000 verification cost
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The Supreme Court of India on Tuesday directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to ensure that polling data is not deleted from the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) during the verification process, responding to concerns raised by the NGO Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).
The ADR had filed a plea alleging that the ECI’s procedure for verifying the EVMs was not in accordance with the Supreme Court’s order issued in April 2024, which had laid out specific guidelines for post-election checks on the EVMs.
In its April 2024 judgment, the Supreme Court had granted candidates who placed second or third in elections the option to have 5 per cent of the EVMs in each Assembly segment examined for any tampering.
The burnt memory or microcontroller of these machines was to be verified by a team of engineers from the EVM manufacturers after the results were announced. This examination was meant to be conducted based on a written request from the candidates, with the costs to be notified by the ECI. The ruling had also made it clear that the verification process should not interfere with the counting of votes.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court bench, consisting of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta, asked the ECI to clarify its procedures. During the hearing, Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing ADR, raised concerns that the ECI was only conducting mock polls to verify the EVMs, a process he argued was insufficient.
He requested that the software and hardware of the machines be thoroughly examined to ensure there was no manipulation.
Similarly, Senior Advocate Devadatt Kamat, representing another petitioner, echoed the concern, saying that the ECI’s mock poll process was inadequate and that the cost for verification, which was set at Rs 40,000 per machine, was too high.
“What we intended was that after the polls, if anyone has a doubt, the engineer should come and certify, in their presence, that there is no tampering with the burnt memory or microchips of the EVM,” CJI Khanna explained.
He specifically asked the ECI's representative, Senior Advocate Maninder Singh, why the ECI was erasing the data during the verification process. The bench made it clear that the purpose was simply to verify the integrity of the memory, not to reload or erase data.
The Court also expressed concern over the high cost of verification. Bhushan pointed out that the ECI’s Rs 40,000 fee for verifying each EVM was prohibitive, and the bench instructed the ECI to reduce this cost.
“That’s too high,” the bench remarked. The court further clarified that the burnt memory in the EVMs, which store the election data permanently, should remain intact during verification. The burnt memory, according to the ECI’s procedure, cannot be erased or reloaded, and the data must be preserved for a period of 45 days following the elections.