Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) are secure and will end the reservations of political parties regarding rigging during elections once and for all, Federal Minister for Science and Technology, Senator Shibli Faraz, has claimed.
The Minister’s remarks came during a demonstration of an EVM, developed by COMSATS University Islamabad, held at Parliament House for the lawmakers.
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Here is how the EVM developed by COMSATS University works
- The EVM will be started in the presence of the Polling Agents (PAs) and its seal will be closed.
- When a voter comes in the Polling Station (PS) to cast their vote, the Presiding Officer (PO) will first manually verify the CNIC of the voter from the voters’ list.
- After verifying their credentials, the PO will press the “Ballot” button on a smaller module of the EVM to enable it to produce a ballot paper only once for the voter.
- After this, the voter will head inside the polling booth where a larger module of the EVM will be placed. The voter will see the names and symbols of all the candidates contesting from their constituency on this module.
- Then the voter will vote for their desired candidate by pressing the button corresponding to the name and symbol of the candidate.
- After this, the EVM will produce a ballot paper which will be placed inside the ballot box by the voter.
- The larger EVM module will be disabled after producing the ballot paper for one voter until the PO again presses the Ballot button on the smaller EVM to enable it for another voter.
- The same process will be repeated for all voters throughout the elections day until the end of polling time.
- The seal on the smaller EVM module will be removed after the end of the polling time again in the presence of Polling Agents. The votes will then be counted manually to produce a final result of a particular Polling Station.
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Since assuming power, Prime Minister Imran Khan has been making efforts to introduce an e-voting system before the next general elections to ensure impartiality and transparency.
In November last year, PM Imran had announced electoral reforms for free and fair elections in the country. The reforms included an e-voting system for general elections, open balloting through a show of hands during Senate elections, and allowing overseas Pakistanis to cast their votes.
