{"id":281267,"date":"2017-03-28T11:36:34","date_gmt":"2017-03-28T06:06:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tehelka.com\/?p=281267"},"modified":"2017-03-28T11:36:34","modified_gmt":"2017-03-28T06:06:34","slug":"polls-apart-obsession-for-evms-is-here-to-stay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/polls-apart-obsession-for-evms-is-here-to-stay\/","title":{"rendered":"Polls apart, obsession for EVMs is here to stay"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"INDIA<\/a>Every Vote for Modi\u2019 seems to have become the new full form of the acronym EVM, which had turned into an \u2018Electronic Victory Machine\u2019 for the BJP during the recent Assembly elections, particularly in Uttar Pradesh. The saffron party is claiming that \u2018Even Voters were Muslims\u2019 (pun intended). On the other hand, Opposition and secular forces are alleging that \u2018Every Vote was Manipulated\u2019.<\/p>\n

They are also pointing out this is the \u2018Establishment\u2019s Veiled Message\u2019 that Modi-led Centre is capable of doing anything and everything to grab or stay in power. \u2018Endlessly Vilifying Muslims\u2019 is just one of them. This is more than evident from its \u2018Ease in Voicing Malice\u2019 against the community during and before the elections.<\/p>\n

Going against the \u2018Electoral Verdict in Manipur\u2019, where BJP ranked second in terms of vote garnering behind Congress, is yet another instance, highlighting the party\u2019s keenness to \u2018Ensure all Visible Methods\u2019 to get the power. Nongthombam Biren \u00a0Singh has been chosen to head the state as BJP is working to \u2018Engineer Valid Majority\u2019 to form its first government in Manipur. Again in Goa, where the saffron party scored less than the Congress, it has been \u2018Exploring Various Methods\u2019 to prove its majority on the floor of the House as Manohar Parrikar has already sworn in as chief Minister of the state.<\/p>\n

Opposition has alleged that \u2018Excess Volume of Money\u2019 is being used for horse-trading. The power game is not new. Congress too had \u2018Executed Violence and Money\u2019 to win polls and form governments in the past. The only difference is that the BJP is doing it a bit loudly, openly and boldly.<\/p>\n

Coming back to EVMs, they have been rejected by quite a few countries, particularly European nations. Netherlands banned them for lack of transparency. Ireland too, after three years of research worth 51 million pounds, decided to junk EVMs. While Germany has declared these machines unconstitutional and banned it, Italy too stopped e-voting. In the US, California and many other states banned EVMs if they did not have a paper trail. Venezuela, Macedonia and Ukraine stopped using EVMs after discovering massive rigging. England and France have never used EVMs. \u2018Each Vote Matters\u2019. Thus, one can\u2019t risk losing any of it to these fraud and \u2018Error-prone Voting Machines\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u2018Ever-Visionary Mayawati\u2019 has called for re-election using ballot papers, which now seems to be more \u2018Error-free Voting Method\u2019. Even Senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy, at one point of time, had said that the EVMs could be easily tampered with and their results manipulated. \u2018Evaluating Views on the Matter\u2019 and making decision accordingly is the right thing to do.<\/p>\n

\u2018Engaging Various sections of the Masses\u2019 on the issue and improving the present EVM system or going back to the paper ballots is the only way forward to protect the democratic nature of the election process. The fate of EVMs, which can make or break an election, \u00a0must be decided jointly. After all, \u2018Each Voice Matters\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018Engaging various sections of the Masses\u2019 on the issue to improve the present EVM system or going back to the paper ballots is the only way forward<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":281269,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23],"tags":[3124,6312,453,5344,5985,1159],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281267"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}