New Delhi: In order to usher in greater satisfaction of voters as well as political parties, the Supreme Court on Monday increased the number of EVM for physical VVPAT counting from one to five per parliamentary constituency.
The bench headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi maintained that the number of EVMs for physical verification with the paper audit trails was being hiked to bring in greater degree of satisfaction in the electoral process.
This order, the court clarified, was not a commentary on any deficiency in the existing system whereby the Election Commission picks up one EVM every constituency for matching the votes with the paper audit trails.
It directed that the EVMs will continue to be picked up randomly and added that the existing set up of having five officials from the EC should be able to carry out this direction effectively.
“The present direction should not also cause much delay in the declaration of the result,” said the bench.
The Court order came on a joint petition by 21 opposition parties, which wanted 50 per cent of the EVMs be matched with VVPATs.
While the bench expressed satisfaction with the existing system, it said that it would be interest of electoral process that EC increases from one to five EVMs for physical verification.
EC had earlier responded unfavourably to the petition. It had said that more counting would also mean more chances of human error and that conclusions by EC were based on a logical process and feedback.