New Delhi, AP 24: The Supreme Court is set to issue directives on Wednesday regarding a series of petitions advocating for the compulsory cross-verification of votes cast in Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) with Voter-Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips.
According to the cause list published on the apex court's website, the matter is scheduled to be heard before a bench comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta, specifically "for directions" on April 24.
Last week, the bench had reserved its judgment on a collection of public interest litigations (PILs) related to this issue. The bench emphasized that official actions are generally presumed to be valid under the Indian Evidence Act and expressed reservations about suspecting everything done by the Election Commission.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, the second-highest law officer of the Centre, criticized the petitioners for frequently filing PILs on the eve of elections, alleging that it undermines the democratic choice of voters.
Mehta also pointed out that the Supreme Court had previously dismissed similar pleas, indicating that the matter had already been settled by the apex court.
In April 2019, the Supreme Court had directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to increase the number of VVPAT slips from one per Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) to five. The court had also laid down guidelines for mandatory verification of VVPAT slips from five randomly selected polling stations after the final round of EVM vote counting.
VVPAT is considered an autonomous verification system for voting machines, enabling voters to confirm whether their votes have been accurately recorded.
