(MENAFN- Live Mint) "Prime Minister Narendra Modi has hailed Supreme Court's EVM-VVPAT judgment in an election rally in Bihar. PM Modi called SC's judgment, \"victory for democracy\".Addressing a public rally in Araria, Bihar, PM Modi launched scathing attack against Congress-Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) alliance Modi said, \"RJD and Congress alliance in Bihar neither cares about the constitution of India, not about democracy. They did not let people exercise their right to vote for decades. Booth capturing was very common... They did not even let the people step out to vote... Now when the poor and honest voters have the strength of EVM, they are trying all they can to get rid of the EVM... Today, the Supreme Court has given a strong verdict saying that the old system of ballot paper voting will not come back\".Opposition 'terribly disappointed' as SC rejects EVM-VVPAT verification pleasOn Friday, the Supreme Court of India rejected all the petitions seeking complete verification of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) votes with their Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips.A two-bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar also rejected pleas to revert to paper ballot voting system, Union Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal welcomed SC's decison on EVM-VVPAT. He said the judgment has exposed opposition parties, including the Congress, that had left no opportunity to \"defame\" the Election Commission.'Culture of trust': Why SC rejected pleas seeking 100% EVM-VVPAT verification?The top court was hearing petitions filed by the Association of Democratic Reforms, or ADR, an independent election watchdog, as well as an individual petitioner. Both sought more transparency in the polling process had argued that every voter should have a mechanism to ensure that their vote has been registered and will be counted. The second public interest litigation plea asked for a complete cross-verification of votes with the paper trails 100% verification of EVM-VVPATs, says SC: 'Blindly distrusting poll process...'A voting machine lists the political party symbols of all contesting candidates and provides a button next to each entry. A voter simply presses the button against the candidate of their choosing. The machine then briefly displays the chosen candidate, allowing the voter to check their choice. The voter is then given an indelible ink mark on their finger from polling booth workers as a mark of having successfully voted transitioned from the paper ballot system to electronic voting machines gradually since the 1990s. The move, however, hasn't been free of criticism, with the losing party often accusing the winner of rigging the voting machines VVPAT system was introduced to ward off some of the criticism with the top court fixing the number of voting machines to be randomly selected for cross-verification in 2013.
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