opposition allegations

Election Commission has defended its machines

EVM hacking challenge to be held on June 3: CEC

NEW DELHI: Afterover the last month that electronic voting machines (EVMs) were tampered during recent state polls, the chief election commissioner (CEC) Nasim Zaidi said today "no proof has been submitted" by the complainants". He also added that the Election Commission will hold its electronic voting machine (EVM) hacking challenge starting June 3 when parties can also come with their IT experts to test them out."Any party can only choose four EVMs used in any four constituencies to demonstrate tamperability. The claimant will have to prove that the results were altered on EVMs with admin and tech safeguards. Parties have to confirm their participation by May 26, 5 pm. Only they will be allowed to take part in the challenge," said CEC Nasim Zaidi, adding, "Each national and state recognised party can nominate three authorised persons."He also said that many parties have registered a complaint with the election body, alleging that there were many discrepancies related to the results recorded in the last few elections, but again, without proof."People who questioned the reliability of EVMs haven't yet submitted any proof or credible material to support their claim." Zaidi said during a long demonstration session to show how EVMs work."Trojan Horse (a key press sequence) can't be inserted into EVMs since chip on EVM is one-time programmable and doesn't have a Wi-fi chip," he said, adding that it is impossible to inject viruses into the voting machine.The CEC also said that all future elections will be held with Voter-Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines along with EVMs in all polling stations to bring in transparency."13 political parties had met the commission earlier this month, questioning why VVPAT machines were not used in the elections," Zaidi said in his clarification.Thetime and again, stating that there is no way to hack EVMs as they are stand-alone machines.Meanwhile, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the BSP and others have accused the EC of working under political pressure to "delay the EVM hackathon ".