Polling and counting: EVMs, VVPAT and NOTA

Detail

1. Polling day: the four steps at the booth

• Polling station: the room where votes are cast. A Presiding Officer runs it with three polling officers.
• Step 1: the first polling officer finds your name on the electoral roll (the official list of voters) and checks your identity card.
• Step 2: the second polling officer does three things:
• puts ink on your left forefinger;
• takes your signature or thumb mark in the register of voters;

• gives you a voter's slip.

• Step 3: the third polling officer takes the slip and checks that your finger has been inked.

• Step 4: you go behind the voting compartment and press the blue button next to your candidate on the EVM.
• A beep tells you the vote has been recorded.

• A VVPAT slip shows your choice for seven seconds.

• Shyam Saran Negi of Kinnaur (Himachal Pradesh) is remembered as independent India's first voter in the 1951-52 general election. NCERT Class 8 uses his story to show what the right to vote means.

2. Safeguards against fraud at the booth

• Indelible ink: ink that cannot be washed off for many days. It marks a person who has already voted, so no one can vote twice.
• It goes on the left forefinger.
• It is supplied by Mysore Paints and Varnish Ltd (a Karnataka government company).

• It has been used since the 1962 general election.

• Challenged vote (Rule 36, Conduct of Election Rules, 1961):

• A polling agent can doubt that a voter is really the person on the roll.
• The agent pays a small fee, and the Presiding Officer holds a short inquiry on the spot.

• If the claim is false, the voter is allowed to vote. If the person is found to be pretending to be someone else, they can be handed to the police.

• Tendered vote (Rule 42; Rule 49P for EVM polls): a vote given to a real voter when someone else has already voted in their name.

• The real voter gets a paper tendered ballot, not a vote on the EVM.
• It is kept in a separate cover and not counted.

• It is kept as evidence in case the result is challenged in an election petition.

• Help for voters with disabilities:

• A blind or infirm voter may take a companion who is at least 18 years old (Rule 49N).

• The ballot unit has braille numbers next to the buttons (NCERT Class 9).

• Booth capturing: taking over a polling station by force so that real voters cannot vote, or so that false votes can be cast.

• It has been an offence since 1989 (s.135A, Representation of the People Act, 1951). The punishment is jail and a fine. Government servants who take part get a longer sentence.

• Under s.58A, the Election Commission of India (ECI) can do one of two things:

  • declare the poll at that station void and hold a fresh poll; or
  • countermand the election in the whole constituency (cancel it and hold it again).

• Re-poll (s.58): the ECI can order a fresh poll at a polling station if:

• the EVM breaks down (mechanical failure);
• ballot papers or EVMs are taken away or damaged; or

• some other serious problem spoils the poll.

• Form 17C: the Presiding Officer's record of how many votes were cast at that station.

• A copy is given to each polling agent when the poll closes.
• At counting, it is matched with the total shown on the EVM.

3. From paper ballot to EVM

• 1951-52: each candidate had a separate ballot box marked with their symbol. Voters dropped a paper into the box of their choice. A paper ballot listing all candidates, which the voter stamps, came in later.
• Electronic voting machine (EVM): an electronic device that records and counts votes instead of paper ballots.
• Timeline:

Year	Event
1977	Idea proposed by Chief Election Commissioner S.L. Shakdhar [3]
1979-80	Prototype made by ECIL and BEL; shown to political parties on 6 August 1980 [3]
1982	First use in 50 polling stations of Paravur (Parur) assembly constituency, Kerala [3]
1984	A.C. Jose v. Sivan Pillai (1984): the Supreme Court set aside the Paravur result. The law then in force had no provision for voting by machine
1988	Parliament added s.61A to the RPA, 1951. EVMs could be used from 15 March 1989 [3]
1998	EVMs used in 25 assembly constituencies in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi [3]
2001	All assembly seats in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Puducherry and West Bengal [3]
2004	Over one million EVMs used in all 543 Lok Sabha constituencies [3]

• Makers: two public sector companies [4]:
• Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL), under the Ministry of Defence;
• Electronics Corporation of India Ltd (ECIL), under the Department of Atomic Energy.

4. How the EVM works

• Parts:
• a control unit (CU), kept with the Presiding Officer;
• a ballot unit (BU), kept inside the voting compartment.

• A cable about five metres long joins them [2].

• Steps to cast one vote: 1. The Presiding Officer presses the "BALLOT" button on the control unit. 2. The voter presses a button on the ballot unit. 3. The control unit records the vote and gives a beep [4].

• Burnt, one-time-programmable memory: the control unit's software is written onto its chip once at the factory and cannot be changed later [4].

• The control unit does not know candidates' names or party symbols. It records only which button was pressed [4].

• It can store up to 2,000 votes [4].

• Standalone: EVMs are not connected to any network and cannot be linked to any other machine [4].

• If anyone tries to open the chip or memory, an Unauthorised Access Detection Mechanism shuts the machine down for good [4].

• M3 EVMs (in use after 2013) [2][4]:

• each ballot unit has 16 buttons, including NOTA;
• up to 24 ballot units can be joined to one control unit;

• so one set can handle up to 384 candidates, including NOTA.

• First Level Checking (FLC): a check of every machine before it is used. Engineers test all machines. Representatives of recognised parties pick 5% of them for a bigger mock poll [4].

• Advantages over paper ballots (NCERT Class 8, Q5):
• no invalid votes, because a button cannot be pressed "wrongly" the way a paper can be marked wrongly;
• faster counting;
• less reason to capture booths. A capturer can stuff a ballot box quickly. An EVM is slower, because the Presiding Officer must release each vote and the machine accepts only a few votes a minute;
• less paper used.

5. VVPAT: the paper trail

• Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT): a printer joined to the EVM.
• It prints a slip with the candidate's serial number, name and symbol.
• The slip shows behind a glass window for 7 seconds, then drops into a sealed box [2].

• Only after the slip falls does the VVPAT signal the control unit to record the vote [4].

• Symbol loading: 10-15 days before the poll, a symbol loading unit puts candidates' names and symbols into the VVPAT's flash memory as small picture files. The memory holds 4 MB [4].

• Legal path:
• Subramanian Swamy v. ECI (2013): the Supreme Court held that a "paper trail" is an indispensable requirement of free and fair elections [4].
• The Conduct of Election Rules were amended on 14 August 2013 to bring in VVPAT [4].
• First use: 51-Noksen (ST) assembly by-election, Nagaland, 2013 [3].

• VVPAT was used in 8 Lok Sabha seats in 2014 [3] and in all constituencies since the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

• How many slips are counted:

• At first, the slips of one EVM in each assembly segment were counted.

• In N. Chandrababu Naidu v. Union of India (2019), opposition parties asked for 50%. The Court raised it to five randomly chosen EVMs per assembly segment [4].

• Rule 56D (counting of VVPAT slips):

• A candidate or agent can apply in writing to the Returning Officer to count the slips of any polling station.
• The Returning Officer gives a reasoned decision in writing.

• If the paper count differs from the EVM count, the paper count wins, and the result sheet (Form 20) is corrected [4].

• Association for Democratic Reforms v. Union of India (26 April 2024; Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta):

• The Court rejected the pleas for a return to paper ballots and for counting 100% of VVPAT slips [4].
• It gave two directions [4]:
  1. After symbol loading (done on or after 1 May 2024), symbol loading units are sealed and kept for 45 days after the result.
  2. A burnt-memory check of 5% of EVMs (control unit, ballot unit and VVPAT) in each assembly segment, done by the makers' engineers: - only the candidate who came 2nd or 3rd can ask for it; - the request must be made within 7 days of the result; - the candidate pays the cost, which is returned if tampering is found.
• The Court also noted that at least 50% of polling stations have CCTV, and the footage is kept for 45 days. That is the same as the time limit for filing an election petition (a case in the High Court challenging the result) [4].

6. NOTA: None of the Above

• Before NOTA, Rule 49-O let a voter "decline to vote":
• the voter told the polling officer, who wrote it down in the register (Form 17A);

• so the choice was not secret.

• PUCL v. Union of India (27 September 2013):

• The Court held that the right to reject all candidates in secret is part of the freedom of voting. This freedom comes from the freedom of expression under Article 19(1)(a).
• It struck down the parts of Rules 41(2), 41(3) and 49-O that broke secrecy, and directed a NOTA button on EVMs.

• It hoped NOTA would push parties to put up better, cleaner candidates.

• Rollout:

• first used in the November-December 2013 assembly elections (Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Mizoram);

• it has had its own symbol (a ballot paper with a black cross) since 2015.

• Legal effect:

• NOTA votes are counted and announced, but they do not change the result. The candidate with the most valid votes wins, even if NOTA gets more votes.

• NOTA votes are left out of the "valid votes" used to decide forfeiture of deposit. A candidate loses the deposit if they get less than one-sixth of the valid votes.

• Scale:

• NOTA gets about 1% of votes nationally in Lok Sabha elections.

• Indore (2024 Lok Sabha election): over 2 lakh NOTA votes, the highest in any constituency.

• Not allowed in Rajya Sabha elections. These are indirect elections: MLAs vote by open ballot under proportional representation. In Shailesh Manubhai Parmar v. ECI (2018), the Supreme Court held that NOTA cannot apply to them.

• "Right to reject" means cancelling the election and holding a fresh one if NOTA wins. The Law Commission did not recommend it. It said the 2013 NOTA judgment rested on secrecy, not on any right to reject [5].
• NCERT Class 8 calls NOTA "a quiet but powerful tool": voters can show they are unhappy without staying away.

7. Counting and declaring the result

• Who is in charge: the Returning Officer (RO) runs the count at the counting centre. Counting agents of candidates and ECI observers watch.

• Order of counting: 1. Postal ballots first, from 8 a.m. 2. EVMs, round by round. In each round, a set of control units is counted at different tables. The totals are matched with Form 17C and announced after every round. 3. VVPAT slips of five randomly drawn polling stations in each assembly segment are counted and matched with the EVM totals.

• Recount (Rule 63):

• a candidate or agent can apply in writing, giving reasons, before the result is declared;

• the RO may allow a full or partial recount, or reject the request if it is unreasonable.

• Declaration:

• the RO signs the final result sheet (Form 20) and declares the result;

• the RO then gives the certificate of election to the winner.

• After the result: EVMs stay sealed in strong rooms (guarded store rooms) for 45 days, the time limit for an election petition [4].

Prelims Hooks

• s.61A, RPA 1951 (added 1988, in force 15 March 1989) allows EVMs. A.C. Jose (1984) had struck down EVM use because no law allowed it.
• First EVM use: Paravur, Kerala, 1982. First use in all 543 Lok Sabha seats: 2004. First VVPAT: Noksen, Nagaland, 2013.
• Makers: BEL (Ministry of Defence) and ECIL (Department of Atomic Energy). They are public sector companies, not private firms.
• M3 EVM: 16 buttons per ballot unit × 24 ballot units = 384 candidates including NOTA. A control unit stores up to 2,000 votes.
• Case–principle pairs:
• Subramanian Swamy (2013): paper trail is "indispensable".
• Chandrababu Naidu (2019): VVPAT check raised from 1 to 5 EVMs per assembly segment.

• ADR (2024): no 100% VVPAT count; 5% burnt-memory check on request by the 2nd- or 3rd-placed candidate within 7 days.

• PUCL (2013) based NOTA on secrecy and the freedom of expression, not on a "right to reject". NOTA cannot change the result.

• Rule matches:
• Rule 36: challenged vote
• Rule 42 / 49P: tendered vote, kept but not counted
• Rule 49-O: old non-secret "decline to vote"
• Rule 56D: VVPAT slip count

• Rule 63: recount

• s.58 = re-poll. s.58A = adjournment or countermand for booth capturing. s.135A = booth capturing as an offence (1989).

• Trap: NOTA is not available in Rajya Sabha elections (Shailesh Manubhai Parmar, 2018). Indelible ink is applied to the left forefinger and has been used since 1962, not 1951-52.

Mains Points

• EVMs vs. trust:
• EVMs removed invalid votes, cut counting time and made booth capture less useful. The machines are standalone and one-time-programmable.
• But whether voters trust the result is a separate question. VVPAT and the 2024 burnt-memory check try to close that gap.

• The debate is about how much random checking is enough versus a slower 100% paper count.

• NOTA's limits:

• NOTA protects secrecy and lets voters protest. But it has no legal effect on who wins, and it gets only about 1% of votes.

• Supporters of a right to reject want a fresh poll when NOTA wins. The Law Commission said no [5]. The concerns are cost, voter fatigue and repeated elections.

• Safeguards at the booth form a layered system: indelible ink, challenged and tendered votes, Form 17C, re-poll (s.58) and countermand (s.58A) together protect "one person, one vote". They also give the courts evidence in election petitions.

• Accessibility: braille on ballot units, companions for blind or infirm voters and postal ballots make universal adult franchise (Article 326) real in practice, not just a right on paper.