Take them for a spin

This refers to the news report ‘Tension on EVMs snowballs’ (September 20). The government is determined to bring in Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) for the next election, while the opposition is set against them. The government claims that the EVMs will end all possibilities of corruption and fake voting in elections. The opposition maintains that EVMs will make it easier for the incumbent government to rig the elections. There is an easy way out.

The government could put up EVMs at open sites and invite individual hackers and technical experts to develop softwares or other hacking mechanisms to change the results. Our engineering students, teachers and experts, working across the country and abroad, may be invited to participate. It will be more impressive if we could invite Russian and American hackers too. If the machines prove secure, the opposition’s fears will be allied.

Dr Irfan Khattak

Abbottabad