The Election Commission on Saturday reasserted that “EVMs cannot be tampered with” and that its faith “in the machines has not wavered through the conduct of various elections, including general elections in 2004 and 2009”.

The Commission, meanwhile, also heard out former Delhi chief secretary Omesh Saigal, who was the first to argue that “EVMs could be rigged through some pre-programmed software”. After his meeting with the Election Commission Technical Committee, Saigal told The Sunday Express that “he had demanded a regular pre-poll and post-poll audit of EVMs and that the poll panel had assured him of a regular audit of the machines”. Prof D T Sahani, who is on the commission’s Technical Committee, and was present at Saturday’s meeting, however, told this paper that “a report of the EC’s Technical Committee had stressed on regular maintenance of the machines way back in 2006”. Sahani stressed that “it could not be linked to today’s presentation”. An official EC release on the other hand said “Saigal made a request to the commission to consider pre-poll audit of the EVMs”.

In his presentation, Saigal wanted to demonstrate “how voting could be rigged from three simulated EVMs” that he had brought along with him. The EC, however, asked him to choose any of the 100 actual ECI-EVMs kept there. “The EC officials declined to deal with, what appeared to be an imitation machine, so as to avoid creating any confusion in public mind,” said the EC release.

While a BJP team comprising G V L Narasimha Rao and Kirit Somaiya met the commission on Friday, other objectors, including Subramaniam Swamy, have also been called by the Commission.