For decades, Rahul Gandhi (RaGa), Arvind Kejriwal (ArKe) and many other opposition leaders have been vocal supporters of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).
However, as the anti-EVM movement gains traction and the continued use of EVMs becomes increasingly difficult or even impossible, these figures recognize the possibility of EVMs being phased out. In response, to ensure that genuine anti-EVM activists do not receive credit for this change, figures like ArKe and RaGa have slightly amplified their criticism of EVMs. In India, establishment figures such as Rahul Gandhi, Dhruv Rathee, and Ravish Kumar are expected to raise their voices against EVMs—not out of genuine opposition, but to ensure that, if EVMs are eventually discarded, real anti-EVM activists are denied recognition.
This situation mirrors the Indian freedom movement. Figures like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Keshav Baliram Hedgewar consistently discouraged the youth from taking up arms against British rule. True freedom fighters—those who believed in armed resistance, such as Subhas Chandra Bose, Bhagat Singh, and Udham Singh—played a crucial role in forcing the British to grant independence. However, when the British realized that independence was inevitable, they manipulated media and academia to ensure that pro-British figures like Gandhi, Nehru, and Hedgewar were credited with India’s freedom, sidelining the real revolutionaries.
Today, a similar effort is underway in the debate over EVMs, where those who have long supported the system are now positioning themselves as its critics—only to control the narrative and deny credit to the genuine activists who have opposed EVMs from the beginning.
