The electronic voting machines (EVM) in its present form are equipped to provide none of the above (NOTA) option strengthening possibility of the Supreme Court order getting underway in the upcoming Assembly polls in five States.
An assertion to this effect was made by the Election Commission in its arguments before the Supreme Court, based on which the Court has asked EC to implement its decision either in a phased manner or at one go. A top EC official indicated that all efforts will be made to ensure implementation of the SC judgement in the forthcoming Assembly polls. “It seems possible to implement the Supreme Court verdict,” he said, adding that the Commission will conduct feasibility studies before its introduction.
The Court had said, “We direct the EC to provide necessary provision in the ballot papers/EVMs and another button called None of the Above (NOTA) may be provided in EVMs so that the voters, who come to the polling booth and decide not to vote for any of the candidates in the fray, are able to exercise their right not to vote while maintaining secrecy.”
A challenge before the Commission will be to link the NOTA button with the voter verifiable paper trail technology-enabled EVMs. The machines are designed with 64 panels which implies that NOTA could only be provided in constituencies where there are 63 or less candidates.
In this scenario, the EC in its written submissions to Court said, “the above facility for a negative vote can be provided in the existing EVMs without any additional cost or administrative effort or change in design or technology of the existing machines.” Where more than 64 candidates are in the fray, the conventional system of ballot paper may have to be resorted to.
The Commission, however, is exploring the possibility of developing EVMs with 200 panels. But this may require the assistance of the Centre to allocate funds. The Court has directed the Centre “to provide necessary help” towards implementing the order. In addition, it asked the EC to undertake awareness programmes in order to educate masses that may be crucial ahead of the General Elections next year.