Two-G (2G) Spectrum Scam Tapes and follow-up

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 20 Apr 2011 11:15

^^^Yup. Why am I not surprised. There had to be a catch somewhere.

Still surprises me the opposition didn;t create major fuss when it started to becomes transparently clear that something is fishy with EVM counting. Why not, I wonder.

ShyamSP · Post by **ShyamSP** » 20 Apr 2011 11:31

Pranav wrote:
The commission has appointed a team of five IIT experts to have small printers attached to EVMs to produce a receipt of the vote cast without disclosing the identity of the voter.

The voter will only be able to see the receipt, which will be dumped into a sealed box. All the receipts will be destroyed once the voting gets over.

But Quraishi said the demand by some political parties, including the BJP, to make the paper trail verifiable later was “dangerous” and unsafe for the voter.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage ... 59092.aspx#

So if paper votes/receipts are "dumped into a sealed box", how does a paper trial identifies a specific voter (so he/she might be killed for wrong voting?) to make paper trial verification "dangerous"?

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 20 Apr 2011 11:39

If someone can tamper the machine to record wrong votes, can't they tamper the machine to print out wrong results as well? This raises two possibilities:

1) that my vote was tampered with as my vote printed out on paper was not the same as the vote that I entered on the machine.

2) I am deliberately lying that the machine printed out the wrong result and can get enough people to tell the same lie so that voting in which my candidate is obviously bound to loose can be cancelled and the name of winning candidate tarnished so that less people will vote for him/her in the next round of voting.

For a paper trail to work, voting will need to be a multiple step process:

1. machine askes voter to press the button next to candidate you want to vote for
2. machine prints out a paper indicating voters choice.
3. machine asks voter to press another button to "lock in" his/her vote to confirm that the printed paper recorded the vote properly.
4. voter then puts the paper in a box.

At this point, we have a confirmation that paper vote is accurately recorded (assuming that the voter can read the paper). Now counting proceeds in two phases:

Phase 1: count electronic votes and declare a "pending winner"
Phase 2: count paper votes to confirm "pending winner"

The winner gets sworn in only after phase 2. If there is a discrepancy between phase 1 and phase 2, that will need to be resolved somehow. I guess my basic point is that this is not just a paper trail, its a rework of the election process.

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 20 Apr 2011 15:38

To speed up paper trail those printouts should be machine readable in a rolls, I guess this process will take some time to Evolve.

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 20 Apr 2011 15:41

ShyamSP wrote:quote="Pranav"]
The commission has appointed a team of five IIT experts to have small printers attached to EVMs to produce a receipt of the vote cast without disclosing the identity of the voter.

The voter will only be able to see the receipt, which will be dumped into a sealed box. All the receipts will be destroyed once the voting gets over.

But Quraishi said the demand by some political parties, including the BJP, to make the paper trail verifiable later was “dangerous” and unsafe for the voter.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage ... 59092.aspx#
/quote]
So if paper votes/receipts are "dumped into a sealed box", how does a paper trial identifies a specific voter (so he/she might be killed for wrong voting?) to make paper trial verification "dangerous"?

Given the type of Politicians in our country, if a particular Polling booth/ Village has voted against a MLA/MP(if he acess to such knowledge) from the party which wins the elections, the very least development in that particular area of constituency will be neglected, or Physical punishments including Death will be given to prominent citizens in the community. Sad but true for India.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 20 Apr 2011 17:16

Aditya_V wrote:To speed up paper trail those printouts should be machine readable in a rolls, I guess this process will take some time to Evolve.

There are problems of pre-printed rolls and of excess vote-printing. It would be better to have the voter drop the receipt into a ballot box.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 20 Apr 2011 18:40

Another salvo from the dirty tricks department steered away:

Shanti Bhushan defends land controversy - http://www.indiablooms.com/NewsDetailsP ... 00411g.php

Sushupti · Post by **Sushupti** » 20 Apr 2011 20:45

Journalists seeking favours

The Facebook page on tracking land allotments and other favours to journos using RTI is up

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Journalis ... 4264284031

ShyamSP · Post by **ShyamSP** » 20 Apr 2011 21:38

Aditya_V wrote:
ShyamSP wrote:So if paper votes/receipts are "dumped into a sealed box", how does a paper trial identifies a specific voter (so he/she might be killed for wrong voting?) to make paper trial verification "dangerous"?
Given the type of Politicians in our country, if a particular Polling booth/ Village has voted against a MLA/MP(if he acess to such knowledge) from the party which wins the elections, the very least development in that particular area of constituency will be neglected, or Physical punishments including Death will be given to prominent citizens in the community. Sad but true for India.

Same risk you commented exists with EVMs if you totalize EVMs and paper votes to a same block level.
Elections through violence is much better and valid than subverting through cheating machines.

Wouldn't it have been better if P.Chidambaram had to resort to violence to get elected instead of magically winning on a recount (A penny calculator gives same result when you add same two numbers everytime).

Paper vote counts can validate clearly if winning is right or wrong for such close election results.

apoorv · Post by **apoorv** » 20 Apr 2011 23:20

I think paper trails will be a bad idea especially in states like Tamil Nadu where freebies have been promised by political parties. As of now, voters can just take freebies and still safely vote for the party of their choice. If paper trails come into existance these parties may put a condition to show the proof of vote before giving the freebies. This method will spread like wild fire in the rest of the country.

Shankas · Post by **Shankas** » 20 Apr 2011 23:26

Airavat wrote:Missing diary registers of the office of the then telecom minister, A Raja, delaying CBI

Given everything is requested in triplicates by babus, if the application itself is missing (disappeared) then doesn't it stand that the Teleco companies in question never applied for and did not receive any spectrum.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 20 Apr 2011 23:29

Apoorv

there are many ways to ensure voter's anonymity while providing the receipt. UNLESS the voters are forced to submit their receipt to the candidate and the candidate has the RIGHT algorithm to decipher the details and voting info.

apoorv · Post by **apoorv** » 20 Apr 2011 23:40

RamaY ji

Yes there are ways like the one mentioned by Dhiman ji. But this will lenghten the counting duration and many will argue that EVMs have lost their value if time is not saved. Although I must accept that the election process will then become almost fool proof.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 20 Apr 2011 23:43

This will be required ONLY when there is a contention. Initially there may be a lot. So be it; democracy is important than few thousand crores. If media is fine with 2G size scams why should they have problems with this?

Virupaksha · Post by **Virupaksha** » 20 Apr 2011 23:58

apoorv wrote:RamaY ji

Yes there are ways like the one mentioned by Dhiman ji. But this will lenghten the counting duration and many will argue that EVMs have lost their value if time is not saved. Although I must accept that the election process will then become almost fool proof.

Sorry, apoorv one of the most nonsensic reason is the time wasting due to paper ballots..

1) Worst case manual counting of paper printouts:
Example, the latest elections in Tamil Nadu were held on 14th April and they will be counted around may 4th all with the EVMs.

Which heaven will fall crumbling if the results come out on the 4th night/5th morning instead of 4th afternoon??

and more importantly, when the results in many cases are declared weeks after elections, is the delay of 5/6 hours max more important than the integrity of elections itself?

2) Best case scanning of paper printouts: Now since we are printing it, we can directly print the symbol and scan the symbol in a machine. Worst case printing, print a barcode along with the symbol and get it scanned.

The above actually solves the consistent and persistent problem of malfunctioning EVMs, where in many cases, when EVMs malfunctioned in afternoon, all the votes cast in the morning had to considered null and void.

3) The most nonsensical of the EC proposal is destruction of papers.

EVMs can never solve the problem of a rowdy standing by in a polling booth and watching what one votes. They are as much transparant to the rowdy as are paper ballots.

If the votes are all mixed in a ballot box, how different is it from the EVM itself? When all you know is the total count from the machine. In the EVM one has to simply press a button to know how the voting has progressed uptil then. With papers, he has to count it manually.

I am unable to understand which problem does the destruction of papers at the end of day solve??

milindc · Post by **milindc** » 21 Apr 2011 00:12

Pranav wrote:Another salvo from the dirty tricks department steered away:

Shanti Bhushan defends land controversy - http://www.indiablooms.com/NewsDetailsP ... 00411g.php

Application form for the scheme , anyone can apply based on the conditions. http://goo.gl/GJNbB

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 21 Apr 2011 07:34

Not expressly related to 2G, but still..

X-posted from the Indian Economy thread..

An interesting idea from Kaushik Basu - legalise "bribe-giving"!

http://finmin.nic.in/WorkingPaper/Act_G ... _Legal.pdf

Basically what he is saying is that there are two types of bribes: "harassment bribes" and "non harassment bribes"..The former are basically the "fetch and carry" types that the common citizenry has to put up with, ie, bribe for a driving license and the like..KB proposes that the "bribe giver" is completely exonerated from any criminality in the act (currently, both bribe giver and taker are culpable)...The impact will be that there will be an incentive for each bribe-giver to act as a whistle blower (if not for anything else then to spite the leech!), while all bribe takers will remain aprehensive of potential whistle blowers...His hypothesis of course it that it will reduce corruption of this type as a result..

Its a problematic idea, and P Sainath today has written a sharp (I also though somewhat personalised) critique of this in the Hindu..But not altogether without merit!

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 21 Apr 2011 07:38

somnath wrote: Its a problematic idea, and P Sainath today has written a sharp (I also though somewhat personalised) critique of this in the Hindu..But not altogether without merit!

Sainath's article: http://www.hindu.com/2011/04/21/stories ... 861000.htm

Let's get this right. The Chief Economic Adviser to the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, wants a certain class of bribes legalised?

Sainath is being less than honest. As per the proposal, bribes will remain illegal. Only thing is that the bribe-givers are offered immunity so that they can become whistle-blowers.

Sainath seems to be a water-boy for the political class.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 21 Apr 2011 07:52

^ that is most nonsensical idea i have heard in this series... (even if it is limited to bribe givers)... This assumes that the corruption is only on the side of receipt... It is one's urge to get to the benefits in short cut that starts the bribery. Imagine a situation where everyone has all the time and patience in the world to follow rules...

Secondly 100% of bribe takers are bribe givers in one or other transaction... It may not be true the otherway though....

That means govt employees become independent consultants starting from Pune to PM. Everyone works for a price and it is not standardized as there always will be competition for limited resources (resource/license allotments). That means one should be rich enough to get the services.

Now these services can start from municipality services to education to healthcare to law and order to judicial to governance to national security.

This is what happens when fking inbreeds get publishing space... Aaak thoo

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 21 Apr 2011 08:04

RamaY wrote:This is what happens when fking inbreeds get publishing space... Aaak thoo

I would not personalise the thing - Kaushik Basu is one of the finest economists in the world today..You just have to see the change in the quality of the Economic Survey since he took over as CEA..He is my bet for the next econ Nobel from India (given that Jagdish Bhagwati seems to be destined to NOT win it!)...

On the idea, yes it is problematic, and has lots of moral hazard issues..But at the same time it has some intuitive appeal - at the passport office, RTO, death/birth registration - this has the potential of balancing out the power equations currently - between the service provider and "customer"...Today, the power equation is fully on the side of the former...

Sainath seems to be a water-boy for the political class

Again, I wouldnt personalise it for Sainath either (even though he himself has in the critique)...P Sainath is one of a vanishing breed of rare journalists who passionately cover the most unglamourous side of news - rural sector, agriculture and the problems thereof...While he has a clear ideological bent, he does it with rare compassion and attention to detail that is so unsymptomatic of the rest of the media, esp the pink media...In this case, he was too engrossed in rubbishing KB to really expand on his real points., IMO of course..

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 21 Apr 2011 08:07

RamaY wrote:^ that is most nonsensical idea i have heard in this series... (even if it is limited to bribe givers)... This assumes that the corruption is only on the side of receipt... It is one's urge to get to the benefits in short cut that starts the bribery. Imagine a situation where everyone has all the time and patience in the world to follow rules...

Secondly 100% of bribe takers are bribe givers in one or other transaction... It may not be true the otherway though....

That means govt employees become independent consultants starting from Pune to PM. Everyone works for a price and it is not standardized as there always will be competition for limited resources (resource/license allotments). That means one should be rich enough to get the services.

Now these services can start from municipality services to education to healthcare to law and order to judicial to governance to national security.

This is what happens when fking inbreeds get publishing space... Aaak thoo

How can a government employee become an "independent consultant", when any person from whom he accepts a bribe from can become a whistle-blower, leading to swift and severe punishment for the said government official?

The paper makes a distinction between harassment bribes and other bribes. It is only for harassment bribes that the bribe-giver would be immune.

For other bribes, the bribe-giver would not be immune, but would be punished much less severely than the bribe taker. That is only fair - if a Judge accepts a bribe from a thief to let him off, the conduct of the Judge is far more criminal than that of the thief. That is because the Judge has been given a position of trust and authority by the People. The conduct of the Judge is akin to Treason - but not so for the thief.

The reason why people are opposing this so vehemently is that it causes too much terror for corrupt politicians and babus.

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 21 Apr 2011 08:16

Pranav-ji, there is intuitive appeal in the idea, as I said before...Unfortunately, I think it will start faltering when it comes to execution quite immediately..For example, definition of "harassment bribes" and "non harasment bribes"...KB says that bribes given for large govt contracts fall under the latter category..But then, if you are a legacy telco in 2008 and you know that the only way you can survive increasing new compettion is by bribing the minister to get bandwidth, is that harassment or not? Will the distinction be made in terms of amounts, or in terms of "types of bribes"?

But the idea merits some thought..One way of takling it might be in terms of defining "services" where this new law applies..So all txns of a citizen in the Passport Office, RTO, Municipality, Land registration office, Patwari, local police station - all these are under the ambit of the law, so bribe givers are exempt..I think these are the places where the "customer" is at maximum disadvantage in tems of balance of power...

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 21 Apr 2011 11:31

ShyamSP wrote: Paper vote counts can validate clearly if winning is right or wrong for such close election results.

Neither electronic-only ballot nor paper-only ballot are secure by themselves since both can be manipulated either by replacing the software/hardware of the electronic machine or by paper vote stuffing.

Ultimately, a secure system will have to involve both paper and electronic ballot coupled with each other where the final results will depend upon counting both paper and electronic votes and checking the counts against each other to ensure proper results.

It should also be independently verifiable, be simple enough for use and understanding of a naive voter and minimize scope for mistakes, etc, etc. Obviously not enough thought has gone into all these aspects of making voting simple, safe, secure, and foolproof. The current voting system is nowhere near what would be considered "secure". This is an extemely important and critical topic where entire books and multiple phd thesis can be written, yet hardly any research is going on.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 21 Apr 2011 16:50

Somnathji,

Knowledge or success in one area doesn't gaurantee absence of stupidity. I read his articles often; that doesn't mean I should become a braindead jombie and accept his nonsense.

This sound personal because he gets some media space and he writes nonsense and people start looking for some value in his excrecia; sorry to be blunt.

For example just because Gandhi is great in satya dharma; that doesn't mean what he does is right always. All his satya dharma ensures is that he says the truth including about his weaknesses.

The issue is corruption - that means two parties exchanging personal favors to get some work done in a manner that it is against the legitimate process and at the cost of opportunity for others and society that is promissed to get the best deal.

In what way one can legalize bribe (giving or seeking)? Why don't the govt remove people from jobs and make them independent consultants and make them earn based on their client's capacity where as govt process will treat all applications that it receives ...

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 21 Apr 2011 17:42

^^Ramay-ji, there are issues with KB's hypothesis, I said that too..However personal comments are perhaps not becoming of the person, unless you are referring to politicians, in which case they are all fair game

In the hypothesis itself, the point that I like is about power equations....Today, ina variety of scenarios - RTO office, or Passport Office, or municipality - the power equations are completely skewed...Which is what leads to corruption...Soemthing like this breaks that equation bluntly...Hence there is some merit to apply it selectively....JMT..

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 21 Apr 2011 18:46

Somnathji,

The so-called intelligentsia (of course exceptions apply) are no better than average politicians (there are many good people there too). KB is fundamentally wrong to think he can right a wrong by legitimizing it.

I know where you are going with your second point. Why should a policy/process has to be skewed to start with? Why should we live with such a skewed administrative infrastructure? Why cant simply the laws and policies and make it a level playing field? A well-known economic professor at NYU described corruption as the 'necessary' lubricant in a controlled economy especially when there is too much red tape; with a smirk on his face. Does it mean he is justifying the use of bribes as a corporate policy to make entry and progress in a controlled economy? Then what is the purpose of all those corporate 'ethics?'

This approach is what I call 'justifying one's deeds'; there is no end to this as it is a slippery slope.

This great soul KB is already coming up with justification and legitimization proposals for corruption, even before we make an attempt to take on this corruption.

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 22 Apr 2011 13:22

11 firms paid Sena 500cr for Jaitapur protests: Rane

somnath · Post by **somnath** » 23 Apr 2011 11:46

A good analysis of the Jan Lokpal Bill by Shekhar Gupta..

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/we-th ... e/780109/0

Sri · Post by **Sri** » 25 Apr 2011 14:26

2G chargesheet: Karuna's wife may not be named

Sri · Post by **Sri** » 25 Apr 2011 14:26

Kalmadi Arrested

BhairavP · Post by **BhairavP** » 25 Apr 2011 15:39

Actually, Kanimozhi named in the chargesheet.
http://www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/s ... 110425.htm

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 25 Apr 2011 16:09

Sri wrote:2G chargesheet: Karuna's wife may not be named

I am disappointed by that. She holds 60% stakes and should be at least a member of the Board of Directors, if not the Chairman (nobody knows the structure of Kalaignar TV). How can she not be held responsible ? I hope somebody brings this to the notice of the Supreme Court.

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 25 Apr 2011 16:53

Kanimozhi charged with conspiracy in 2G scam case

Just to emphasise the point made by SS, the daughter is charged, the wife is not. Could it be that touching the wife would be red line for the DMK.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 25 Apr 2011 20:19

^ Grownup children are considered not part of the family. On the other hand charging Ammal == charging MK
...

Looks like each family has to sacrifice an apple. Who in Royal family is expendable?

svenkat · Post by **svenkat** » 25 Apr 2011 21:26

Charging Dayalu ammal would be grossly unfair.She is a house wife of an earlier era 1930s,knows nothing about business,deals,politics.She is a dummy either for MK or for her progeny.Arresting her would have been seen as vindictive and harassing an old ignorant/innocent woman.

milindc · Post by **milindc** » 25 Apr 2011 21:31

RamaY wrote:^ Grownup children are considered not part of the family. On the other hand charging Ammal == charging MK
...

Looks like each family has to sacrifice an apple. Who in Royal family is expendable?

Robert Vadra

Muppalla · Post by **Muppalla** » 26 Apr 2011 04:32

while the soap opera of 2G, CWG is going on with predicted scapegaoting, it seems another 26 lakh crore one is in the pipe line. This new one is called Coal scam. The responsible minister was PM as he was the coal minister at that time.

I just don't think this is true. His calculation of 26 lakh crore seems fishy. Any experts here?

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 26 Apr 2011 07:04

svenkat, the Law of the land does not provide for any such concessions. She may be an ignorant, old lady choosing to act as a 'front' for somebody else as you said. Let that 'somebody else' then come forward, own up and give her a reprieve. If not, then that 'somebody else' also escapes under the cloak of not arresting an old, ignorant housewife. She is responsible for the consequences of her choices. She could as easily have chosen to remain an old, ignorant 'housewife' but she chose to sit on the Board of Directors of the company. How could she claim now that she was on the board only for purposes of 'quorum' ? That in itself is an absurd argument. Besides, why should CBI's action be seen as vengeful with this old woman alone and not with Kanimozhi or Balwa or anybody else for that matter ? Age doesn't allow anyone exemption from law, does it ?

svenkat · Post by **svenkat** » 26 Apr 2011 08:21

SSridharji,

I agree with you.But realistically can Mu Ka be arrested?

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 26 Apr 2011 08:52

svenkat, Karunanidhi has always claimed that apart from his films and film songs penned by him being telecast occasionally on Kalaignar TV, he has absolutely nothing to do with that company. So, it is a moot point whether Ms. Dayalu Ammal was acting as his front or not. However, if she had indeed acted on behalf of somebody else, the scope of investigation must widen. Culprits must be chargesheeted; the court will decide if they ended up in jail or not.

To me, it appears that an effort is being made to dump everything on Sharath Kumar of Kalignar TV and hold him solely responsible for the acts of commissions and omissions.