Supreme Court seeks Election Commission’s reply on opposition plea to audit 50% of EVMs
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the Election Commission to respond to a petition by 21 opposition parties seeking verification of at least 50 percent of electronic voting machines against their Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips in the general election.
The court’s direction
A bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justices Deepak Gupta and Sanjiv Khanna issued notice to the Commission and asked it to send an officer to help the bench when the matter is next heard on March 25.
Who filed the plea and why
Leaders behind the petition included Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu of the TDP, along with Arvind Kejriwal (AAP), Sharad Pawar (NCP), Akhilesh Yadav (SP), Farooq Abdullah (NC), M.K. Stalin (DMK), Sharad Yadav (LJD) and Derek O’Brien (TMC).
They asked the court to require that 50 percent of EVM results be cross-checked with VVPAT records before results are declared. In February, the opposition parties had made a similar request to the Election Commission, asking for such an audit in every constituency during the Lok Sabha polls. They said they had “serious doubts about the credibility of EVMs and the purity of the entire electoral process” and wanted the paper trail physically matched with electronic votes in at least half of all machines, if not all.
What happened next
The 2019 Lok Sabha election was held from 11 April to 19 May, with counting on 23 May 2019. The BJP won 303 of 543 seats and Narendra Modi began a second term on 30 May 2019.
See also: elections.
Originally published on 15 March 2019. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.
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