COUNTERVIEW:
National: Thursday, September 05, 2019.
In
a surprise move, one of India’s top electronics public sector undertakings,
Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL), has refused to disclose details under the Right
to Information (RTI) Act about Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and Voter
Verified Paper Trail (VVPAT), used by the Election Commission of India (ECI)
for voting across India, stating that such a disclosure “would endanger the
life of its engineers.”
Ironically,
in June this year, the ECI took an identical view while refusing to disclose
under the RTI Act details of the dissent notes of its Commissioner Ashok Lavasa
on decisions pertaining to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's speeches, which were
alleged to have violated model code, saying it may "endanger the life or
physical safety" of an individual.
Top
RTI activist Venkatesh Nayak, who is with the advocacy group Commonwealth Human
Rights Initiative (CHRI), had sought information on EVM and VVPAT following
“scanty information” about the manner in which polls were conducted across
India in April-May 2019 general elections, which returned the National
Democratic Alliance (NDA) government to power with a thumping majority.
Dissatisfied,
says Nayak in an email alert to Counterview, several private citizens and
mediapersons used RTI to seek information about voter turnout data mismatch,
complaints about EVMs malfunctioning, complaints about mismatch of EVMs and
VVPAT printouts, movement of EVMs and VVPATs to the electoral constituencies
from the manufacturing companies, and details of action taken on complaints
received against high profile politicians for violating the Model Code of
Conduct.
After
many of these requests were turned down by relevant public authorities, Nayak
asserts, on June 17, 2019, he decided to file two identical RTI applications
seeking information from BEL, as also the Electronics Corporation of India Ltd
(ECIL), the two manufacturers of the voting machines.
ECIL,
says Nayak, “Uploaded some of this information on the RTI Online Facility but
rejected access to some crucial bits of information sought in my RTI
application”, but has not received “a formal reply from ECIL.”
As
for BEL, Nayak says, initially, the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO)
of BEL “sent a fee intimation letter for Rs 1,434 for a total of 717 pages
after almost a month”, agreeing to “supply most of the information”, even
though denying “access to the VVPAT patent application filed with the Office of
the Controller General of Patents by citing Section 8(1)(d) of the RTI Act.”
How could BEL say it did not have necessary
information on EVMs, VVATs? Which papers did they count before sending the
reply that information was contained in 717 pages?
After
sending a draft of Rs 1,434 and waiting for 40 days, when Nayak did not hear
from the BEL CPIO, on August 28, 2019, he filed an appeal under the RTI Act
challenging the non-supply of information, to which, the CPIO, who immediately
sent in a reply, returning the bank draft and “claimed that BEL did not have
most of the information sought which he had agreed to supply in his first
reply”.
The
reply particularly said that the disclosure of information would "endanger
the life or physical safety of engineers who carried out the assignment related
to preparation of EVMs and VVPATs", hence it was being "denied under
section (8(1)(g) of the RTI Act, 2005."
Wondering
how could CPIO say that he did not have necessary information, asks Nayak, “Which
papers did he count before sending the first reply?”, suspecting, the latest
reply is “an afterthought arising out of pressure exerted – probably by an
external agency against making this information public.”
Nayak
says, refusal to part with information under the RTI Act runs counter to what
the Union Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions said
about the NDA government's commitment to transparency while replying to the
debate on the Bill to amend The Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) in the
Lok Sabha on July 22, 2019.
Referring
to RTI, the minister claimed that the government “has been absolutely
committed, as in other wings of governance, to ensure full transparency and
full accountability". Comments Nayak, “Sadly, this governance philosophy
does not seem to have percolated downwards beyond the corridors of the Prime
Minister's Office (PMO) with which the Union Minister is associated.”
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