MUMBAI: The Hyderabad-based Forensic Science Laboratory today informed the Bombay High Court that the electronic voting machines used at two booths in Pune during the 2014 Maharashtra assembly elections were not tampered with. Justice Mridula Bhatkar had in May this year ordered forensic examination of the EVMs, on a plea alleging that they had been tampered with.
The bench had then directed Pune's district collector to send the EVMs from booth number 185 and 242 of the Parvati constituency to Hyderabad's Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) for necessary tests.
The FSL today submitted its report to the high court. "It is opined that no evidence of tampering, altering or any other manipulation could be detected. There is also no evidence of any tampering to access data," the report said.
"The machines were forensically analysed and it has been found that they are standalone, non-networked, one-time programmable machines which are neither computer controlled externally nor could be connected internally or to any network," it said.
The report also said the machines are working properly. Justice Bhatkar took the report on record and posted the matter for further hearing next week. The high court was hearing a petition filed by a Congress candidate, Abhay Chhajed, who had lost.
Chhajed said he had received much less votes than expected from the booth number 185 and 242. In his application, he had said that 89 voters from the two booths had sworn affidavit stating that they had voted for him, but he actually got only 69 votes from the said booths.