Foolproof Election System

A) Subject: Foolproof Voting - Action against fraudulent Voting system in India to regain the people’s faith in Our Election System…




We are proud to be a citizen of world’s largest democratic nation. We broke the tentacles of autocratic monarch ruling and established the democratic ruling in India. In democracy the citizen of the nation we ourselves rule us and we have the responsibility of electing Member of Legislative Assembly and Member of Parliament from our respective constitutions. We use our right of voting through ballot papers in earlier elections and now through the Electronic Voting Machines. Through this we provide our vote to the candidates whom we want to elect from the list of candidates. The entire process is being controlled and managed by the autonomous body called the Election Commission of India.



The entire mess begins here. The political parties and the ruling parties are gambling with the voting rights of the people and does election fixation. Many representatives are being elected through this sort of fixation and still celebrate it as the victory for the democracy, which is a great comedy in the real democracy. This is how the democracy is killed in the Republic country and the dynasty ruling without crown is established in democratic covers in which the same family members rule the state / country by generations. This is very much visible in the country and also in many states like Tamil Nadu. The only way to establish a real democratic rule is to make the election system a foolproof and tamper free.



Today’s election system has many flaws in it and it raises many doubts in its results. We need to find a solution for this messy election system to ensure the highest security and the reliability to ensure real democracy in at least future.



B) Reason: Election Department had forgotten to ensure the security in reliability of the election result with existing voting system.



Earlier Paper Ballot Box System: In the earlier elections, we were using the Paper Ballot Box system. The paper ballot system employs uniform official ballots on which the names of all candidates and their symbols are printed. Voters record their choices, in private, by marking the symbols next to the candidate and drop the voted ballot in a sealed ballot box. These sealed ballot boxes from various booths are brought to central counting booths, where the ballot boxes will be opened and manually counted in presence of the contesting candidates representatives.



Present Electronic Voting Machine System: Now, we are using Electronic Voting Machines (EVM’s) instead of the old paper ballot box. This EVM’s does not solve many of the problems since it is the same old wine in the new bottle. This is nothing but Direct Recording Electronic voting machine, which eliminates Paper Ballot Voting system.



The EVM is a set of two devices running on batteries. One device is Voting Unit, used by the Voter and another device is Control Unit, operated by the Electoral Officer. Both units are connected by a 5 meter cable. The Voting unit has a Blue Button for every candidate, the unit can hold 16 candidates, but up to 4 units can be chained, to accommodate 64 candidates. The Control Units has three buttons on the surface, first button to release a single vote, second button to see the total number of vote cast till now and the third button to close the election process. The result button is hidden and sealed.

Here the eligible voters are manually verified by the Polling Officers in the Polling station. Eligible voters are checked for their identity using their Voters Identity Card / Passport / Ration Card / PAN Card and they are allowed for voting. Voter will be called by name as usual to put his signature on Voting Register. Electoral Officer will put special ink on his finger and hand over a slip containing voter’s serial number as shown in the Voter Register. Voter will hand over the slip to Presiding Officer and he will satisfy himself about the genuineness of the particulars of the voter. After all these formalities, voter will be asked to reach at Electronic Voting Machine kept in a corner covered from sides to maintain secrecy of the vote. The voters directly enters their choices in the Electronic Voting Machine by pressing the concerned push button near the respective candidate’s symbol and their vote is cast and stored directly in the internal memory. Red light will appear on pressing push button and beep sound will be heard which will indicate that the ballot has been caste.

Number of these EVM’s from various polling booths are sealed and transferred to the central Counting Booth where the votes are counted. Normally, an EVM displays results on the display panel of the control unit. But a printout option is available with the use of a Download Adaptor Unit (DAU). The DAU has to be connected to the control unit and any standard printer.

Even these current EVM’s fail to address the core issues of democratic election system. They fail to ensure the foolproof voting system to prevent fraudulent voting in the democratic election.





1) It raises many doubts in the Identity verification system since it is being manually checked. The polling officers who are all government officials / employs are under the state government and it is very much possible for the ruling party to influence them in favor. They may allow anyone for voting without checking the identity which paves way for fraudulent voting.

2) EVM Tampering is very much possible in the proprietary model that too in the digitally advanced world.

3) The software and circuits embedded in the EVM’s very well contain numerous flaws for tampering

4) EVM’s are manufactured in the two major public sector companies owned by Government of India which is under the influence of the ruling party raises many doubts of pre-program in favor of the ruling party.

5) Since the source code of the EVM is proprietary and kept undisclosed, the genuineness of the system is in doubt.



The EVM’s have many problems and still it has lot of flaws for fraudulent voting. To overcome these issues and to ensure foolproof and secured voting we can opt for better technology as explained bellow.



C) Solution: Hence we should find a way for foolproof and secured election system. We hope Biometric Online Digital Voting will provide foolproof and reliable election system…



BACKGROUND:

Electronic Voting Machines are used to record votes cast during an election so that election results can be available in a matter of a few hours instead of the several hours or days that were once necessary. Voting machines have eliminated some voting irregularities, such as the problem of stuffing ballot boxes that existed with paper ballots. But still the EVM’s doesn’t have any Voter verification to permit only the eligible voter to cast his vote and only his vote. While electronic voting machines speed-up the voting & counting process, problems still exist.

One major problem is to ensure the person voting is actually the registered eligible person entitled to vote and not a fake. Voter’s identification is manually checked by polling officers, sometimes not checked at the polling station and possibility for partiality is not ruled out. Also identification is verified by comparing a Voter's Identification Card, Vehicle Driver's License or Passport against the registered voter list and it does not guard against a forged Voter’s Identification Card, Driver's License or Passport or etc,. Hence, it is the need of the hour to think about definitive and foolproof identification for voting.



Digital National Identity Card (DNIC): Digital National Identity Card should be a multi purpose smart card. The task of computerized data generation & maintenance shall be done by an autonomous body under Home Ministry, which shall be shared between Election Department, Police Department, Census Department (RGI) and any other if required. Also it should be ensured for highest level of accuracy, secrecy and security for the data’s. The first step is to build a complete computerized record of all citizens above the age of 18.

The Digital National Identity Card should poses the mandatory personal data’s stored on the micro-chips embedded in the card and it will be accessible only to authorized users, like officials of Election Department, Police Department. The DNIC should contain the personal data’s like photo, age, address and Common Unique National Identity number including Biometric fingerprints to make it foolproof.

Utilization of DNIC for Voter Verification: Now the voters list shall be generated from the common computerized records maintained under home ministry for the purpose of DNIC. The voters list shall be displayed in every voting booth to check if their name is in the specific booth. Once they confirm their name availability, they can enter booth and can insert the DNIC in the slot provided in the Online Digital Voting Machine. Once the DNIC is inserted the Online Digital Voting Machine will verify the Data from the DNIC with the data available in the central data storage sever in online through internet connection. First it will verify general data for the authenticity of the card. Then the authentication of the person holding the card will be checked in biometric system by scanning his/her fingerprint and comparing it with the fingerprint stored and maintained in the central data storage server. The Biometric system of verification is believed to the most dependable system of verification and is being used in many high security areas. Once the authenticity of the voter is verified and ensured, he/she will be allowed to cast his/her vote.

Biometric Online Digital Voting:



System Configuration: At polling station it consists of:

1. A Computer system with required software

2. A touch screen

3. Biometric Fingerprint Scanner

4. Smart Card (DNIC) Reader

5. Internet Connection



System Description:

The proposed Biometric Online Voting System(BDOV) is a solution to overcome almost all the problems in the present voting system. The Biometric Digital Online Voting system comprises of Centralized Digital Data Computer Server, which stores and maintains all the data of the citizen. This Centralized Data Server is connected to the Polling Station Computers in online through internet for accessing the data from the Central Data Server and verifies it with the data in the DNIC.

Description of Voting System:

When the voter enters the polling station, he/she will be verified manually for his eligibility through visual inspection of the DNIC with the specific voters list. After ensuring the availability of voter name in the list, the polling officer will allow the voter into the polling station. Once the eligible voter enters the polling booth, he/she should insert the DNIC into the reader attached to the Voting Computer for Electronic & Biometric Verification. The computer in polling booth will access the online data from the Central Data Server through internet.

Once the general data from the DNIC of the voter is verified with the data of the Central Data Server, he/she will be asked to scan his/her fingerprint in the fingerprint scanner attached to the computer in the polling station. The live scanned fingerprint will be verified with the stored fingerprint in the Central Data Server for authentication.

Once the validity of the voter is confirmed, the voting computer will allow only that person alone to access the voting system. The touch screen of the computer will display the list of candidates along with their symbols. The voter can select his/her choice of candidate by touching respective symbol of the candidates. Once the voter touches his/her choice of symbol, the respective symbol will be displayed to the full screen and ask his/her confirmation for whether he/she wishes to vote for the selected symbol with YES or NO question displayed in the touch screen. If he/she touches YES, the vote will be cast and accepted. If he/she touches NO, again the touch screen will display the list of candidates to enable to voter to choose the correct candidate.

The voting information is recorded at the computer of the voting station and transmitted immediately online for storage at the computer of the Central Data Server and simultaneously makes the voter's database inaccessible throughout the voting system to prevent duplicate voting. At the same time the Central Data Server connected online will display the count of votes for each candidate, the total votes cast instantaneously and the details are stored online. The results shall be known immediately after completion of voting time.

Advantages of the Biometric Digital Online Voting:

1. Only authorized or valid person only can vote.

2. Highly foolproof because of Biometric Fingerprint verification.

3. Counting happens online simultaneously and it does not require separate counting, which ensures reliable results.

4. Prevents duplicate / multiple voting, since it makes the data inaccessible immediately after first vote casting.

5. Prevents unregistered / unauthorized persons from voting.

6. Tampering of voting system is impossible since the entire system is digitally secured.

7. Flexibility of voting from any polling station of the region or state or country.

8. Influence of Election Officers in favor of someone is totally ruled out.

9. Fraudulent voting is totally ruled out.