Tanseen Poonawalla demands RTI from the Election Commission on the EVM Tampering allegations!!!

Pradip Bhandari, the CEO and founder of Jan Ki Baat interviewed Entrepreneur and Congress supporter Tanseen Poonawalla on his allegations about the tampering with the EVM in the recent BJP win.

Tanseen Poonawalla made a claim that could destroy the entire fabric of the Indian democracy. He has supported a party which was always in the forefront in the National struggle. On asking on basis did he conclude that the EVMs were tampered, he replied that he had submitted the RTI documents to the Election Commission. So, either the election commission should reply to the RTI or take up the tampering and manipulation cases. Poonawalla suggests that VVPAT (Voter-verified paper audit trail) should be introduced. But it would be of no use if one just counts the votes on the EVMs and not on the VVPATs. The EVMs and VVPATs should be tallied in the constituencies so the VVPATs come into use.

But how can one tamper a one-time programmable device with no signals?

On this, Poonawalla challenged that that all EVMs or any electronic device can be tampered with. The election commission of India should open up the challenge for Indian media, International media and hackers as well as the representatives from foreign democratic election commission to come down and witness the tampering.

In this never ending debate about the EVMs being tampered with, Poonawalla said that as a citizen of India, he has the right to question. Its a democratic right given to every citizen by the constitution of India.

He further questions, ‘Does it behold a constitutional body like the election commission to run down another constitutional body like the Delhi Assembly? If the election commission thinks its not true, which it does, why doesn’t it inquire about the 4000 missing EVMs and put it out on Public record?’

In 2013, the Supreme Court said that the use of VVPAT is indispensable. Hence, the VVPATs and the EVMs should be tallied and the process should be transparent for every part of the democracy.