Overview
- Ravi Shankar Prasad said returning to paper ballots would take elections back to the days of booth capturing.
- He cited at least two dozen Supreme Court and high court judgments that have upheld the use of electronic voting machines.
- Prasad recalled the Election Commission’s public invitation to parties to try to hack EVMs and said no party took up the challenge.
- Following the Bihar elections, mandatory VVPAT checks at five randomly selected polling stations per assembly constituency reported no mismatches with EVM counts, and no requests were filed to inspect micro-controllers.
- BJP member Kangana Ranaut dismissed paper ballots as outdated and echoed the government’s stance that it will not revert from EVMs, which it says make polling faster and safer.