SC seeks govt’s view on introduction of totalisers for counting of votes

• The Supreme Court has asked the view of the central government on introducing a ‘totaliser’ system for counting votes recorded on Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).

• A bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana observed that the mechanism “might be an enabler and good for anonymisation of voters”.

• The bench was hearing PILs which sought that the election results be declared for an entire parliamentary constituency.

• The petitioners said that current booth-wise counting reveals voting patterns of individual polling stations.

What is a totaliser?

• Totaliser is a device which can accommodate up to 14 Control Units of the EVM at a time to aggregate votes without revealing the candidate-wise count of individual EVM used at a particular polling station. 

• Totalisers are not presently in use.

• Prior to the introduction of EVMs, ballot papers could be mixed, wherever it was considered “absolutely necessary” under Rule 59A of the Election Rules.

• Using a totaliser would increase the secrecy of votes during counting, thus preventing the disclosure of voting patterns and countering fears of intimidation and victimisation.

• The results of votes polled in a group of 14 EVMs would be calculated and announced together, in a change from the current practice of counting votes by each polling station.

• The Law Commission in its 255th report endorsed the Election Commission’s suggestion for introducing a totaliser for the counting of votes recorded in EVMs.

• Similar to the existing Rule 59A, the Law Commission proposed to amend Rule 66A to empower the ECI to decide when, and in which constituency and polling booths, to employ a totaliser, after taking into consideration various factors and the overall context of the elections.