The Supreme Court on Friday refused to pass an interim order on a petition seeking a direction to the Election Commission to publish on its website the Form 17C data, or the voter turnout data per polling station, within 48 hours of the voting coming to an end. The court said an interim order on the current plea would amount to granting relief in a similar petition filed by the petitioner, pending since 2019.
The petition
The Association for Democratic Reforms filed a petition before the Supreme Court seeking a direction to the EC to publish the Form 17C data on its website within 48 hours of conclusion of polling. The ADR emphasised the need to put the data out in the public domain, because of what is described as a substantial difference between the initial voter turnout figures released by the Commission and the final figures.
What is Form 17C?
The Conduct of Election Rules, 1961 require the EC to maintain two forms- Forms 17A and 17C. Form 17A records the details of every voter who enters a polling booth and casts their vote. Form 17C contains the total number of votes cast.
Under rule 49S(2), the presiding officer has to provide a copy of the data entered in Form 17C to the polling agents of candidates at the time of the close of polling. The data recorded in Part I of Form 17C includes the unique ID number of the EVM used at a particular polling booth, the total number of voters enlisted at that booth, the total number of voters who entered the polling booth and whose details were validated on Form 17A, the number of voters who did not vote despite signing on the register, the number of voters who were not allowed to vote, the number of test votes, and the number of total votes recorded in the EVM. Part II of Form 17C is used to record the results of the election.
What makes Form 17C data important
The data in Form 17C is used by candidates to verify the details provided during counting, such as the ID number of the EVM and the number of votes polled per polling station. The candidates can challenge a result if there is a discrepancy between the data in Form 17C and the data emanating from the counting centre. They can also file petitions in the high court challenging the election result on the basis of the mismatch between the counting data and the figures in Form 17C.
Why the demand to make public Form 17C data
Opposition parties and civil society have objected to the Commission only releasing voting percentage, and not the total number of votes polled in a constituency. They have questioned why the Commission took 11 days after the completion of the first phase of voting and four days after the second phase to release the figures. It has also been pointed out by them that there is a sizeable difference between the initial voting percentage released by the EC and the final figure made public by it. They have demanded that the Form 17C data be made public to allay concerns regarding data on the total number of voters and the total number of voters who have cast their vote.
The Election Commission's response
The Commission maintained there is no legal mandate for it to make public the total number of votes cast in each polling station. It says copies of Form 17C are shared with the polling agents present immediately upon the close of polling. It says candidates are aware and in possession of the exact voter turnout data in absolute numbers even before it is known to the Commission.
On the issue of significant difference between the initial voter turnout percentage and the final figures, the Commission said voters continue to vote even after 6pm due to long queues at polling stations and that is added to the figures later.
