Election Commission will never go back to era of ballot papers, says CEC Sunil Arora

Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora has categorically stated that the Election Commission of India would not be intimidated or coerced to go back to paper ballot system. He said that Commission would continue to use Electronic Voting Machines and Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail machines.

CEC Sunil Arora was speaking at an International conference on ‘Making our Elections Inclusive and Accessible’ in New Delhi today. He termed the recent controversies surrounding EVMs as unfortunate.

CEC said, the Election Commission’s Systematic Voter’s Education and Electoral Participation program has been a success in empowering voters. The process of counting votes through EVMs is completely reliable as it is designed & constructed by experts.

CEC said that there is no question of returning to the era of ballot papers and that the election commission will continue to use EVMs and VVPATs. The commission is open to all suggestions but will not remove EVMs under any threat or pressure..