ECI official dismisses Tulsi Gabbard’s poll manipulation claim, says Indian EVMs cannot be connected to internet

Amidst US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s claims of finding evidence of massive vulnerabilities in voting machines that have allowed hackers to flip votes and tamper with elections, an Election Commission of India (ECI) source on Saturday said that some countries use Electronic Voting Machines which are a mix of multiple systems, machines and processes which also include internet and other private network.

The sources further said that India uses Electronic Voting Machines, which can neither be connected to any network nor WIFI and work like simple and accurate calculators. The ECI sources said that these machines have stood on the legal scrutiny of the Supreme Court of India and are invariably checked by the various political parties at various stages.

This includes conducting mock polls before the actual election polling starts. The sources added that more than 5 Crore VVPAT slips have been verified and matched while counting in front of Political parties.

What did Tulsi Gabbard say?

On Thursday, while addressing the media, Tulsi Gabbard said that the cabinet has found “evidence of how these electronic voting systems have been vulnerable to hackers for a very long time and vulnerable to exploitation to manipulate the results of the votes being cast”.

She further said that the findings mandate the use of paper ballots across the country so that voters can have faith in the integrity of the US elections.

“We have evidence of how these electronic voting systems have been vulnerable to hackers for a very long time and vulnerable to exploitation to manipulate the results of the votes being cast, which further drives forward your mandate to bring about paper ballots across the country so that voters can have faith in the integrity of our elections”, Tulsi Gabbard said while speaking to reporters.

Earlier on March 31, the Election Commission of India (ECI) concluded its largest-ever engagement drive with political parties, conducting 4,719 meetings nationwide at the levels of chief electoral officers (CEOs), District Election Officers (DEOs), and electoral registration officers (EROs).

According to an ECI release, these meetings, held over 25 days, included 40 by CEOs, 800 by DEOs, and 3,879 by EROs, engaging over 28,000 representatives from political parties across the country. (ANI)