Karnataka polls: EC gets EVMS from other states

BENGALURU: Amidst fears of the EVM malfunctioning or tampering, the Election Commission has brought in hundreds of the machines from other states for the May 12 Karnataka assembly polls, an official said.

“Electronic Voting Machines from other states, including Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh were brought to Karnataka to make up for the shortfall, as few outdated machines have been discarded and few others are stuck in court cases related to alleged rigging of votes,” the state Joint Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) K N Ramesh said here.

The EVMS were reportedly also brought from neighbouring Tamil Nadu, besides Maharashtra and Jharkand.

EVMS with Voter Verified Paper Audit Trails (VVPAT) are to be used in all the 58,546 polling stations in the 224 assembly constituencies of the state.

The VVPAT helps in providing feedback to the voters after casting the vote through an EVM.

Allaying fears of EVM tampering, the state CEO Sanjiv Kumar told the media earlier that a robust system was in place and none could tamper with the machines.

The southern state has 4.96 crore voters — 2.52 crore men, 2.44 crore women and about 4,500 people who identify themselves as the third gender.

A total of 15,42,000 youth in the 18-19 age group have enrolled to vote for the first time in the ensuing poll.

In all, 3,56,552 personnel will be deployed to conduct the polling.

The vote count will be done on May 15.