The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG), in its draft report, has criticised the Chief Electoral Office of Delhi for failing to justify the reason behind Rs3.57 crore incurred to set up another disaster recovery site, despite already having one in the national Capital.
However, even after the attack from CAG, the Chief Electoral Office of Delhi has decided to set up another site to save data related to electoral rolls. The ongoing debate also presents a dark side of how leniently the system works despite continuous cyber attacks from hostile neighbours, including Pakistan and China.Interestingly, the Election Commission of India (ECI) had directed Delhi Electoral Office to set up disaster recovery site by August 2012 but the same could not be set up till Delhi Assembly polls in 2013. Eventually, with the constant delay in getting approval from various departments, the total cost of the project increased from Rs2.24 crore to Rs3.57 crore.
The department took 13 months to get approval from the Information Technology Department of Delhi Government. The delay on the part of the department to get approval in time resulted in time overrun by 17 months and cost overrun by Rs1.33 crore. The ECI had specifically directed the Delhi Election Office to create a strong system that can prevent hacking and set up a disaster recovery site for electoral rolls management system.
“The CEO office already has a disaster recovery site for electoral roll management system at NICSI centre laxmi Nagar and has incurred Rs 1.06 crore up to March 2014. The office is also paying rent for co-location of the system. However, when the department was asked to justify the expenditure of Rs3.57 crore to set up a new system, no reply was furnished till close of the audit. Thus, the expenditure incurred on setting up of at another location is also not justified,” the draft report said. The CAG has sought comments from the CEO of Delhi in this regard.
In last year’s Assembly elections, some hackers attacked the website. However, our experts averted the invasion but it led to delay in the live counting service for one or two hours. In last couple of years, hackers from China and Pakistan have attacked many major websites of India, including those of National Investigation Agency’s (NIA) and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). According to a Government data, about 2,000 Indian Government and non-government websites were attacked in the last two or three years.