NEW DELHI, July 25 � The Supreme Court today asked the Election Commission to decide within three weeks on whether there is a need to modify Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) so that a voter can verify and confirm his voting, reports PTI.
A bench headed by Chief Justice SH Kapadia asked the Commission to decide the representation made by a Shiv Sena activist seeking modification in the machine so that a voter could check that his vote has not been cast in wrong way and he could get an acknowledgement slip after casting vote.
The court passed the order on a PIL filed by the activist Rajendra Satyanarayan Gilda who alleged that the Commission has failed to take any decision despite his repeated representation.
Advocate R R Deshpande, appearing for the politician, said that a voter has the right to know that his votes has gone in favour of the candidate to whom he voted and this facility is not available in EVMs.
�Right to vote includes right to know or right to verify that to whom vote given has really gone or whether it is rightly gone in favour of the candidate to whom it was intended by the voters,� he said, adding that an acknowledgement slip has to be provided to voters.
�In the present system of voting through EVMs there is no such facility by which a voter can verify and confirm his own voting. At present voter presses a button only but cannot ascertain the actual voting. He is not sure that whether his vote is recorded or not, if recorded whether it is recorded in favour of the person to whom it was intended or not? Whether it is valid or invalid and whether it is counted or not?� the petitioner said in his petition.
