NGT junks plea on making electronic voting machines mandatory

NEW DELHI: The National Green Tribunal today refused to entertain a plea seeking directions to make the use of electronic voting machines ( EVMs) mandatory in all elections across the country to save enormous amounts of paper from being wasted every year.

A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar said there was nothing substantial with regard to environment and ecology in the plea.

"Why don't you approach the Election Commission. You have not raised any contention with regard to the environment," the bench said.

The tribunal was hearing a plea filed by Salek Chand Jain, through advocate Sugriva Dubey, seeking directions to the Centre and the Election Commission of India to use only electronic voting machines (EVMs) in all elections across the country to save trees from being cut.

During the hearing, the counsel sought liberty to withdraw the petition after which the tribunal "dismissed the plea as withdrawn".

The plea sought directions not to allow any publicity materials like posters, pamphlets, flyers and cards made of paper by the candidates.

Earlier, the NGT, in a separate matter, had restrained Delhi University Students Union from pasting pamphlets and other material on the walls on the varsity campus as it pollutes the environment by creating litter and defacing the walls.