NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court of India on Tuesday dismissed a plea seeking to revert to paper ballot voting in elections, asserting that allegations of tampering with electronic voting machines (EVMs) often arise only when candidates lose. The bench, comprising Justices Vikram Nath and P.B. Varale, remarked, "What happens is, when you win the election, EVMs are not tampered with. When you lose the election, EVMs are tampered with".

The plea, filed by petitioner evangelist Dr. K.A. Paul, also sought directions to disqualify candidates for at least five years if found guilty of distributing money, liquor, or other inducements to voters. The court questioned Paul's involvement in political matters, noting his background in social work and asking why he was entering the political arena.

The petitioner-in-person Paul argued that foreign countries use paper ballots and suggested India should follow suit, he also said that he had been to over 155 countries and every country in the world, has ballot paper voting. "Every democracy in the world, if you see has physical ballot paper, unless dictators, because they do not have elections. However, the bench countered, "Why don't you want to be different from the rest of the world?" and emphasized that EVMs have also been successfully used in numerous countries. The bench also asked him whether each of the nations had ballot paper voting or used electronic voting.

Paul also claimed that the CEO and co-founder of Tesla, Elon Musk, had said that EVMs could be easily tampered with along with that Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief N Chandrababu Naidu who is the current chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, and former state chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy had also claimed EVMs could be tampered with. The bench however noted that when Chandrababu Naidu lost, he said EVMs can be tampered with, and now this time, Jagan Mohan Reddy lost, he said EVMs can be tampered with.

The bench also asked Paul, how he gets such ideas, "You have interesting PILs. How do you get these brilliant ideas?" the bench asked to which he replied that he is the president of an organisation which has rescued over three lakh orphans and 40 lakh widows.