The Supreme Court on Tuesday heard a petition seeking the formulation of a policy for verification of the burnt memory and Symbol Loading Units of the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) from Election Commission of India (ECI). 

During the hearing, the court directed the Election Commission not to delete or reload any data from the EVMs. 

SC sought a report on the process of destroying the memory and microcontroller of the EVMs after vote counting.  

The petition was filed by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) regarding the verification of EVMs. 

A bench comprising Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta instructed the Election Commission, "Please do not delete any data from the EVMs. Also, do not reload them. Let them be examined. Additionally, submit a detailed report within 15 days on the process of destroying the memory and microcontroller of the EVMs after the elections."

ADR’s demand  

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing ADR, stated, "We demand that the Election Commission’s procedures align with the Supreme Court’s ruling and follow the standard operating protocol. We want an independent examination of the EVM software and hardware to determine whether any tampering has occurred. Our petition also requests that the Election Commission submit a report on the memory of EVMs and its guidelines." 

Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna questioned the Election Commission, asking, "Once vote counting is completed, will the paper trail remain with the EVMs, or will it be removed?"

In response, Bhushan stated, "EVMs need to be preserved, so perhaps the paper trail should remain within them.

After hearing arguments from both sides, the Supreme Court reiterated its previous orders, stating, "We do not want any disruption in the vote-counting process (as per the earlier order). However, we also want any doubts regarding tampering to be addressed through engineering verification."