EVMs made by BEL 'non-tamperable', says CMD

The Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), manufactured by defence PSU Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL), were ‘non-tamperable,’ the company’s Chairman and Managing Director M V Gowtama declared here on Saturday.

Addressing mediapersons here, Gowtama said not a single case of mismatch between EVMs and VVPATs were reported in the Lok Sabha polls. The ‘storm’ created by political parties before the elections has now died down, he noted.

The EVMs had come under a cloud over allegations of tampering by several opposition parties in the just-concluded general elections. “I assure you that the EVMs manufactured by BEL are non-tamperable and no mischief can be played with those EVMs,” he said.

To a question related to the opposition parties’ charge that there was a mismatch between votes polled and counted, Gowtama said the storm had died down. “They (the opposition parties) all knew very well that these machines cannot be tampered with.”

Gowtama was convinced that democracy in India could survive only with EVMs. Voting and VVPAT (voter-verified paper audit trail) machines ensure that no rigging takes place. For candidates who had any doubt, he had an advice: “He is free to approach the court after elections, within 45 days...that option is available to the candidate.”

BEL had supplied EVMs to about 400 of the 542 constituencies where elections were held this time. ECIL supplied the rest. In all, BEL had delivered about 10 lakh-plus sets of control units, ballot units and VVPATs in the previous financial year.

The company, according to Gowtama, netted a revenue of Rs 2,600 crore from the Election Commission’s order of EVMs. However, there are no pending orders from the poll panel. But BEL expected orders from state governments for different elections during the current year. This may not exceed Rs 100 crore.

For the financial year 2018-19, BEL recorded a turnover of Rs 11,789 crore, a growth of 17% over the previous year.

On the long-range surface-to-air missile (LRSAM), Gowtama said BEL had an order for 11 ship-sets for LRSAM. The company proposed to deliver the first ship-set during March 2020. BEL is a partner for the system, jointly designed and developed by DRDO and IAI-Israel.

BEL recently completed the assembly and testing of a satellite for remote earth monitoring. Gowtama said the company expected more orders from Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) during the current year.