‘Reverting to paper ballot means return to booth capturing’

New Delhi: Amid a push by opposition parties to revert to paper ballot elections, senior BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad on Wednesday hit back, saying it would mean going back to the days of booth capturing.

Participating in a debate in Lok Sabha on ‘election reforms’, the former Union law minister said the opposition should not talk of returning to the old ballot paper system. There are at least two dozen Supreme Court and high court judgments validating the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs), he said.

Prasad recalled that the Election Commission had invited parties to hack EVMs in its presence, but none turned up. “Now they are raising a hue and cry (against EVMs),” he said. Prasad also noted

that after the recent Bihar elections, “not one plea” was received to check the micro-controllers of EVMs.

To boost voters’ confidence, a mandatory verification of voter verifiable paper audit trails unit (VVPAT) slips was held for five randomly-selected polling stations per assembly constituency, but no discrepancy was found with the EVM count anywhere in Bihar, he said.

The government has repeatedly ruled out going back to the ballot paper system as EVMs have made the election process faster and safer, Prasad said.

The EVMs crossed an important milestone in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls -- of being used in five parliamentary polls since 2004, he added.

Prasad lashed out at the Congress for levelling allegations of ‘vote chori’ ahead of the Bihar elections but not filing a single complaint to buttress its claims after the results.

He said the Election Commission has been mandated to conduct elections and take all incidental steps to ensure clean elections. Prasad said Rahul Gandhi’s campaign during the Bihar elections, riding a motorcycle along with his sister Priyanka, sent a message of the good quality of roads.