The Big Story: 99 problems

Much has been made of the role of Electronic Voting Machines over the last few weeks, especially in the aftermath of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s massive win in Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls. Opposition parties, from Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and even the Congress have made noises about how EVMs are being manipulated on a large scale, endangering democracy and granting victories to the BJP. As proof, they point to a small set of stories circulating that seem to show EVMs registering a vote for the BJP no matter what button is pressed on the machine.

At least one of those stories is not factual. As Scroll.in found while reporting from Bhind in Madhya Pradesh, media coverage of an EVM trial that showed one machine giving multiple votes to the BJP no matter what button was pressed turned out to be the result of shoddy journalism. Considering the ease with which these stories have spread, amplified by Opposition politicians who have latched on to the hacked-EVMs narrative, it brings up the question of how much truth there is to the other incidents as well.

Meanwhile, actual elections – bye-polls for Lok Sabha seats that had become vacant – proceeded various parts of the country, despite doubts raised about democracy being beholden to EVM technology. In the Srinagar Parliamentary bye-poll, voter turnout on Sunday was just 7.14% and protests saw eight people killed across the constituency. In Madhya Pradesh’s Ater, there were incidents of violence and allegations of booth capturing in a few areas, coupled with demands for repolling. And in Chennai’s RK Nagar, the Election Commission decided to call off the election altogether, citing concerns about the “effect created by the distribution of money and gift items”.

To be fair, tampered EVMs would exacerbate any of these issues. It is important that, while defending its record and attempting to quash rumours about faulty EVMs, the Election Commission also needs to be constantly evaluating the dangers posed to its process by the advent of new technology.

But it is also telling that the challenges in these constituencies – violence, allegations of booth capturing, bribery – are serious issues without any question of technological tampering, enough that in one case the Election Commission called off the election altogether. The politicians concerned enough to turn EVMs into an issue that they campaign over ought to be equally worried about these incidents. If violence, booth rigging and bribery are enough to alter results of elections before people even reach the voting booths, political parties don’t even have to think of attempting to painstakingly tamper with individual EVMs. Even as the Election Commission fends off political attacks on the function of EVMs, its real challenge remains the ability to conduct free and fair elections not just within the booths but outside them as well.

The Big Scroll

Punditry

  1. Gopal Sankaranarayanan in the Indian Express lists out the many ways the Supreme Court has been under attack, from without and within, over the last few months.
  2. “It is now entirely likely that by the time the [Supreme] Court gets around to hearing the challenge, the government will render Aadhaar a fait accompli,” writes Suhrith Parthasarathy in The Hindu.
  3. Kirit Parikh in the Times of India explains how a violent, all-encompassing prohibition on cow, and effectively buffalo, slaughter would mean no one would want to keep cows anymore.
  4. Varun Gandhi in the Economic Times has some suggestions for reforms that would improve the political process.

Giggles

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Sandhya Menon tells us how families in India are desperately ill-equipped to deal with mental illness in their midst.

“The idea that something about me is putting a physical and emotional strain on the people I love the most is a familiar and malefic ghost around me every single day. I am not alone – if you are someone who suffers from depression or any mental illness, this happens to you too. Every day you fight the insurmountable battle to be who you should be for your family against your compulsions and pain. We sometimes deaden ourselves to that battle. Sometimes, we fight, fight, fight till we no longer are able to understand what it is that we are fighting. It is this thing that tears families apart.

Even as families think you are making an effort to accommodate your illness and their feelings, there are times when you simply cannot do the many things required of a functioning person living in a community. For the past three months, I have been living with a relapse of depression. It is also a time when my parent are visiting me. I watch my mother fold the clothes, tidy up the house, do the little chores that go towards maintaining a home. I see my father feed the dog and help my children with things. I know these are things I must do. And yet, I sit there, reading, looking into my phone, painting – doing things that make me feel good in the immediate sense.”