The Election Commission (EC) has decided to purchase 1,500 electronic voting machines (EVMs) to increase the reliance on technology in the voting process. However, these machines are not being used in the 11th parliamentary elections.
Senior EC officials said that they are moving forward with the country email list aim of using these machines in future parliamentary elections. However, the commission is in favor of not using EVMs before building popularity and trust. Because that capability has not yet been developed.
EC officials say that four things are very important for the use of EVMs. First, the required number of machines. Second, trained manpower. Third, the habit of voters and fourth, the consensus of political parties.
Of the four issues, the last three are the most important. Because even if machines are purchased, people with technical knowledge are needed to use them. Voters also need to be given that knowledge, which is called voter education. Then, political parties need to be brought into trust.
EVMs must be tested in local elections to gain trust from parties and for voter education. None of these have happened. Although the EC conducted voting in a maximum of ten centers in the recently held city corporation elections using EVMs. But compared to the national elections, it is almost zero percent.
Meanwhile, no law has been enacted yet for voting using EVMs in national elections. The main law for parliamentary elections is the Representation of the People Order (RPO)-1972. The Election Commission will be able to vote using these machines in parliamentary elections only if the RPO is amended to include provisions for the use of EVMs.
EC sources say that the agency has decided to include the provision for the use of EVMs in the RPO. But there are only five months left for the 11th election. During this time, the proposal to amend the RPO will have to go through the process of vetting in the Law Ministry, approval by the Cabinet, and passing in Parliament.
In addition, sufficient time is required to train polling officers, voters, and build the machines. And five months is too short to do the entire job. Therefore, it is not possible to use it in the 11th National Parliament election in any way.
Meanwhile, EC Secretary Helaluddin Ahmed has already told the media that the RPO amendment will not be done before the 11th parliamentary elections. In this case, even if the issue of using EVMs is included at the last minute by hastily amending the RPO, the device may be used in important polling stations. For this, the current EVMs may be used.
Sources say that even though EVMs were not used in the 11th Parliament, the Election Commission is trying to move forward with all the work at once for their use. For this, the EC has sent a project proposal worth about Tk 3,000 crore to the Planning Commission's Project Evaluation Committee (PEC). The PEC was supposed to meet on Sunday (August 19) but cancelled the scheduled meeting.
EC Secretary Helaluddin Ahmed said that the PEC will hold a meeting after Eid regarding the project proposal. We are optimistic about the project.
Officials say that even though the project has not been approved by the PEC, the EC is already manufacturing some EVMs on a limited scale from the Bangladesh Machine Tools Factory. Once the project is approved, an agreement will be signed with BMTF. The commission is also discussing the revision of the RPO. The issue of EVMs will be raised in the commission meeting after Eid for the revision of the RPO. This is how the organization is organizing all the work.
In this regard, Election Commissioner Kabita Khanam said, "Even if the law is amended and machines are purchased, the issue of our capacity is very important. More than one lakh EVMs will be required for 40,000 polling stations. In this case, there is an issue of training so many people for EVMs. Therefore, EVMs will be used taking into account capacity."
The system of EVM voting in the country was introduced in 2010 by the ATM Shamsul Huda Commission. At that time, the goal was to use the machine in parliamentary elections after it gained popularity in local elections. Following their lead, the Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmed Commission also used the machine successfully in several elections.
But in 2013, an EVM malfunctioned during the Rajshahi City Corporation elections. The Rakib Commission could not find the reason for the malfunction. The EVMs at that time were manufactured by Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology and BMTF. The EVMs were originally the result of a project by BUET.
After the trouble in Rajshahi, the Rakib Commission did not use EVMs in any other election. They later destroyed about 1200 EVMs. At the same time, they decided to make more advanced EVMs. In continuation of this, the current KM Nurul Huda Commission is moving towards making new EVMs. In this case, the EC has decided to take up a new project and have the device made by BMTF. As a test case, voting was held in about 30 centers in the Khulna, Rangpur, Rajshahi, Sylhet and Barisal City Corporation elections using the new EVMs made by BMTF.