The Election Commission has set the ball rolling to buy over 16 lakh paper trail machines for electronic voting machines in the next two years to be used in all polling stations in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
The commission issued letter of intent to ECIL and BEL -- both PSUs -- on Friday, two days after the Union Cabinet cleared its proposal to buy 16,15000 voter verifiable paper audit trail units at an estimated cost of Rs 3,173.47 crore.
The poll panel has informed them that the machines would be bought during 2017-18 and 2018-19.
The commission will buy 8,07,500 paper trail units each from the two manufacturers by September, 2018.
Explaining the importance of the step, the Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi said on Sunday that "this will enhance transparency and uphold the voters' right to know which party he or she has voted, thereby increasing voters' confidence in the free and fair electoral process."
The poll watchdog said in a statement that these machines be manufactured by both the PSUs only as per the design approved by the Commission based on recommendation of the Technical Experts Committee on EVMs constituted by it.
"The commission shall closely monitor the production of VVPATs for timely delivery well before General Elections 2019," it said.
Sixteen parties had recently petitioned the EC to revert to paper ballot system for greater transparency. The Bahujan Samaj Party, the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress had attacked the EC on the issue of alleged tampering of EVMs.
The VVPAT machines leave a paper trail which helps an elector confirm whether the EVM has faithfully registered the vote has has cast to a particular candidate.
Between September, 2013 and March this year, the commission has written 38 times to the government on the procurement of VVPATs, according to an affidavit filed by the poll panel in the Supreme Court on the issue.
The Supreme Court has asked the Commission to give a tentative time-frame by which it can use VVPAT machines in all polling stations.
The EC says ECIL and BEL need 30 months to produce the over 16 lakh VVPATs.
