Talking to Republica, Chief Election Commissioner Neel Kantha Uprety said that the Indian side has informed Nepal that it would not be able to deliver EVMs for the fresh Constituent Assembly (CA) polls scheduled for November 19. [break]
“India could not test EVMs [with a maximum of 384 voting buttons] being developed there for its own needs. So, there is no possibility of using the EVMs in the upcoming CA polls,” Uprety said. [
Nepal requires EVMs with more than 64 voting buttons. The existing EVMs developed in India have only 64 buttons, which means they can be used only for 64 parties or candidates.
Altogether 139 political parties have applied to register at the Election Commission (EC) for contesting the new CA poll.
According to Uprety, a high-level technical committee in India had been working to develop EVMs with a maximum of 384 voting buttons for the Indian general elections scheduled for 2014.
India had assured Nepal it would confirm by the last week of June whether or not it would be able to deliver EVMs for the CA poll. It had given the assurance during a meeting that Chief Election Commissioner Uprety had with his Indian counterpart, VS Sampath, in New Delhi on June 14.
Although the EC needs the upgraded EVMs only for voting under the proportional electoral system, as the number of political parties will exceed the existing number of voting buttons, the constitutional body will not use them even for first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting.
“We will use ballot papers for both electoral systems as it will be confusing for voters if EVMs are used for FPTP voting while ballot papers are used at the same polling booth for the proportional electoral system,” Uprety told Republica, adding, “It will be difficult from a managerial viewpoint also.”
Though two Nepali scientists have also developed an EVM, it is still being tested by the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) and the Institute of Engineering, Pulchowk.
“We will conduct separate tests but there is no chance of any full-fledged use of Nepal-made EVMs,” the chief election commissioner said. He maintained that Nepali EVMs can be used in a subsequent election, even in elections for local bodies. “They can also be sold to another country in future,” Uprety maintained.
The EC was seeking 20,000 EVMs for the CA election. The constitutional body on May 28 had decided to use EVMs in 119 electoral constituencies in 23 districts.
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