We are ready, onus now on AAP: EVM-makers

Technical representatives of Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), specially called by the Election Commission to demonstrate the reliability of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and voter-verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) at the all-party meeting on Friday, are confident the Aam Aadmi Party will not be able to meet the challenge to tamper machines manufactured by them.

"We are curious to see what AAP will say after it fails to break into our machines. We can vouch for their reliability. People who claim that the machines can be hacked into perhaps do not know the hard work goes into making them," said a senior BEL official.

Each component of the EVM and the VVPAT machine goes through 94 quality checks, including inspection by a third party — STQC. Every component is tested for 10 lakh cycles for durability before being put to use, said a technical expert of BEL.

"It is correct that we import about 40 components from outside but all are sanitised and tested," said the official.

"They are tested with robust procedures and the software used is burnt into a One Time Programmable/masked chip that cannot be altered or tampered with," the official added.

To add to the security the software of EVMs is developed in house by a selected group of engineers in BEL and ECIL independently from each other and a select software development group of 2-3 engineers designs the source code. The software design then is tested and evaluated by an independent testing group to ensure that the software has been written as per the requirements laid down for intended use only.

Machine code of the source programme code is then given to the micro controller manufacturer for writing in the micro controllers. From the machine code, the source code cannot be read neither the source code is handed over to anyone outside the software group of the PSUs.

The source code for the EVM is stored under controlled conditions at all times. The software is so designed that it allows a voter to cast the vote only once.

Even if it is assumed hypothetically that the source code has gone out, it's of no use and cannot be fed into as the ballot unit accepts only one button press at a time that needs to be validated by the official on the control unit.

Possibility of any hacking before also gets negated by the fact that just two hours before the polling a mock test is done in front of the political agents of all parties.

"The onus now is on the AAP to prove that our machines can be tampered with. We are ready for the challenge and hope that they will come and try their hardest on the day that will be fixed by the EC and won't develop cold feet," said the BEL official.