AAP seeks clarity on EC's EVM hacking challenge

The Aam Aadmi Party on Saturday said it will meet the Election Commission in two days to seek clarity over the proposed challenge to hack the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).

Without revealing whether it will take part in the challenge, AAP leader Sanjay Singh said there was no clarity in the EC's 'hackathon'. "In two days, a delegation of our party will meet the EC and seek clarity on the proposed EVM challenge to better understand the terms and conditions," Singh told reporters. He said the Commission had issued certain guidelines regarding the proposed hacking which were not fair.

The EC on Saturday announced it will hold a hacking challenge from June 3 to prove that its EVMs cannot be tampered with or hacked and came out with a framework of conditions under which this will be done.

Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi said the challenge will be open to all parties that participated in the recent elections in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur and had claimed the EVMs were tampered with. Singh, meanwhile, said that hacking cannot be done under guidelines. "There should be no guidelines for hacking EVMs. EVMs cannot be hacked by reciting mantras. One will need to open it... EVMs can be tampered by changing the motherboard. We showed this in the Delhi Assembly."

Another AAP leader, Atishi Marlena, said the codes were programmed in the motherboard of the EVMs. Thus, reprogramming the EVMs' motherboard will be needed by opening it.

"Our delegation will also ask the Commission whether it will allow the AAP experts to change the motherboard and let them take inside the tools during the challenge," she said.

Singh also said that 18 political parties have met President Pranab Mukherjee and the EC and demanded the use of paper ballot instead of EVMs.

The poll panel had announced after an all-party meeting on May 12 that it will hold the challenge to let political parties prove their claim that the EVMs used in the Assembly elections between February and March were, or could be, tampered with.The EC had also announced that all future elections will be held using VVPAT (voter-verifiable paper audit trail).