'Chat Bhi Meri, Pat Bhi Meri': Jyotiraditya Scindia's Sharp Rebuke To Rahul Gandhi On EVM Hack Claims

'chat bhi meri, pat bhi meri': jyotiraditya scindia's sharp rebuke to rahul gandhi on evm hack claims

New Delhi: Jyotiraditya Scindia, Union Minister attacked Congress MP Rahul Gandhi over his remarks on the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM), saying that "people of the country are aware that the Congress party makes claims of EVM hacking if they lose the elections."

Launching a direct attack at Rahul Gandhi, Jyotiraditya Scindia said, "Chat bhi meri, pat bhi meri', this will not work every time. If you win EVM is Hero and if you lose EVM. People of the country are now aware of this policy of the Congress party, that's why they have made BJP government for the third time with full majority..."

Scindia's comments come amid the ongoing controversy surrounding claims of EVM tampering, ignited by Elon Musk's tweet and a media report alleging that the Shiv Sena candidate in Mumbai North West constituency was found using a mobile phone linked to an electronic voting machine during the vote counting on June 4.

Musk's comment was in response to a social media post from independent US presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr, who raised concerns about irregularities in a primary election. “Puerto Rico’s primary elections just experienced hundreds of voting irregularities related to electronic voting machines, according to the Associated Press. Luckily, there was a paper trail so the problem was identified and vote tallies corrected,” the original post read.

Meanwhile, former Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar countered Musk's criticism of the electronic voting machines, where the Tesla CEO stated that the risk of EVMs being hacked by humans or artificial intelligence (AI) is "too high." In a post on X, Elon Musk wrote, “We should eliminate electronic voting machines. The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high.”

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Rajeev Chandrasekhar wrote, “This is a huge sweeping generalization statement that implies no one can build secure digital hardware. Wrong. @elonmusk's view may apply to US n other places - where they use regular compute platforms to build Internet connected Voting machines.”

Discussing the operation of EVMs in India, the former Union Minister wrote, “But Indian EVMs are custom designed, secure and isolated from any network or media - No connectivity, no bluetooth, wifi, Internet. ie there is no way in. Factory programmed controllers that cannot be reprogrammed. Electronic voting machines can be architected and built right as India has done. We wud be happy to run a tutorial Elon.”

After former Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar’s response to billionaire businessman Elon Musk's statement, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi also joined the debate. The Congress MP said on Sunday that EVMs in India are a "black box" that no one is allowed to scrutinise.

In a post on X, Rahul Gandhi wrote, “EVMs in India are a "black box," and nobody is allowed to scrutinize them. Serious concerns are being raised about transparency in our electoral process. Democracy ends up becoming a sham and prone to fraud when institutions lack accountability.”