A Waste of Public Money, and More

After the most recent assembly elections in India gave impressive wins for the Bharatiya Janata Party, it led to the unusual accusations by the usual suspects – that the electronic voting machines (EVMs) used in Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere had been tampered with by the ruling party to benefit them, or simply ensure their victory.

Chief among those were politicians who were impacted the most. Mayawati was quick to call a press conference right after election results were declared, and accuse the central govt of having tampered with the EVMs. In Delhi, its Chief Minister, who’s political fortunes, after having soared impressively in the first two years of his entry in politics, have been in a downward spiral since he became the Chief Minister a second time, began his usual blame Modi rant, and sustained it for weeks.

The accusations of these two characters, and many other insecure politicians, have literally no basis. No complaints have been lodged by any voter in any of the five states where elections were held. The Election Commission did well by strongly defending the existing process around manufacture and management of EVMs, along with the security features of the machines. One recalls a feeble and short-lived protest against EVMs by the losing BJP a few years ago after an election, but they did not go beyond a statement or two. No one from BJP ever sought re-election, did not protest with the President nor hurled baseless accusations at the govt of the day or the Election Commission. They accepted the defeat and moved on.

But here we have the “game-changer” of Indian politics, who wouldn’t take a break from his trademark anti-Modi looney tunes, going on and on about “tampered” EVMs. He even took the unprecedented step of calling for a special attendance or MLAs in the Delhi assembly to demonstrate tampering of a device that looked like an EVM, but the origin of which wasn’t disclosed to the general public.

More recently, AAP MLA Saurabh Bhardwaj travelled to Botswana to secure international backing for his party’s farfetched accusations. According to this report, the person complaining there too is from the Opposition! 

Even the technology-savvy Finance Minister of the UPA drew an amusing parallel between Pentagon’s hacking and that of EVMs, completely bypassing the fact that EVMs are standalone while in operation. As for tampering, the security procedures followed by the Election Commission will give an insight into whether EVMs can be compromised or not, what the chances of compromise are and to what extent the compromise is possible, if at all. The same EVM management procedures most likely would have existed in 2009 when BJP received a battering at the hands of the Indian voter.

Earlier this month, the Election Commission declared a date on which it has invited the naysayers to hack its EVMs. This offer was completely unnecessary. The accusations of the losing parties have literally no basis. Why does the Election Commission, which is runs on taxpayer money, have to waste its time and money to cater to accusations of politicians who don’t stand tall on the credibility scale?

But clearly, the invitation to hack has exposed the Opposition. After making much noise for a couple of months, almost no one has taken the offer to hack the machines!

The live telecast of the attempts to “hack” will give much joy to our competing news channels. As for the naysayers, after they’ve wasted much public money and some more of the already limited credibility they enjoy, hoping to witness their glorious self-destruction, soon. India can’t afford to sponsor politicians’ tantrums.

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