“I voted for the Lok Sabha elections, but I am worried. I am worried my vote may not go to party I voted for.”

This is a common statement a lot of Indians who have voted so far are reporting. There have been many reported cases of the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) malfunctioning in the first phase of the elections.

The EVM is a machine where the name of the candidates along with the names of their party and the symbol are placed. Right next to the EVM, is a machine with a small screen, called the VVPAT.

The Voter Verifiable Audit Paper Trail, in short VVPAT, maintains printed record of the votes cast. Therefore you can verify that your vote has gone to the same person you have voted.

The VVPAT was introduced in 2013 to make the paper trail an ‘indispensable requirement of free and fair election.” Hence, to make elections transparent India ordered 16,15,000 VVPAT machines were ordered.

The malfunctioning of the EVMs has led to 21 political parties approaching the Supreme Court of India. They demanded that to win the faith of the people in EVM, 50% of EVMs must be verified with paper trail of VVPAT.

Until now for Lok Sabha elections, VVPAT slips of one booth per assembly were matched with the EVMs. That’s a mere 0.4%!

This year in April the Supreme Court directed the Election Commission to increase VVPAT verification to 5 EVMs in one Assembly segment in each Parliamentary seat in the general elections 2019.

Despite the fact that over 3000 crores was spent in purchasing VVPAT machines, their data is not being verified.

The Supreme Court stated that it would verify data from 5 EVM’s making that a 2% verification. While the best case scenario is a 100% verification, through this petition, I am asking for a 50 percent random verification of EVM through VVPAT before declaring the results.

Together, we can approach millions of other people like us who doubt the EVM to prevail over election commission, and make sure that our vote really counted!