EVM: SC stays HC gag order

The Supreme Court (SC) on Friday stayed the Uttarakhand High Court's (HC) gag order, which banned criticism of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).

A Bench comprising Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra and Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud stayed the HC directions, which amounted to a blanket ban on the criticism of the use of EVMs in the recently concluded Assembly elections in five states.

The top court passed this order on the heels of an appeal challenging the HC order and issued a notice to the Election Commission of India (ECI) on the special leave petition, seeking the poll panel's response within six weeks.

Appearing for petitioner Ramesh Pandey, Advocate Devdutt Kamat said such an order was unsustainable and impinged on the freedom of speech and expression.

Hearing a PIL against the validity of ECI's EVM challenge, the HC had on June 2 observed that political parties had launched a sustained campaign to tarnish ECI's image. The court observed that political parties "should have waited for the outcome of election petitions pending in this court as well as in other High Courts," before forwarding any criticism.

"The ECI has successfully held free and fair elections. We cannot permit political parties to lower the image and prestige of the Constitutional body," the court had said in its 17-page order. It further observed that it was the court's duty to insulate Constitutional bodies from "unhealthy criticism".

The Division Bench comprising Justices Rajiv Sharma and Sharad Kumar Sharma had said, "The foundation of democracy would be weakened in case this tendency on the part of certain sections of the society to damage the institution by leveling unsubstantiated allegations is not curbed. The right of freedom of speech and expression does not permit to level unsubstantiated charges against the functionaries of Constitutional bodies."

In the interest of larger justice, the court had also restrained all political parties, NGOs, and individuals from "criticising the use of EVMs in the recently conducted elections of the state Assemblies, even by approaching the electronic media, press, radio, Facebook, Twitter, etc. till the decision of the election petitions".

The HC order had come in the light of allegations that EVMs used in the Assembly elections of five states were rigged. Junking these reports in June, the EC had organised a Hackathon challenge to prove the impossibility of tampering with the machines. At the last moment, however, candidates from various Opposition parties backed out of the challenge.