New Delhi, April 26 -- In a significant development Friday morning as the country commenced voting in the second phase of the 2024 Lok Sabha election, the Supreme Court has given Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) a big vote of confidence.

A two-judge bench rejected petitions seeking 100 percent verification of votes cast on EVMs using the VVPAT, or Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail.

We have discussed, elaborately, all protocols and technical aspects (and) we reject all pleas. Blindly distrusting a system can lead to unwarranted suspicions, Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Sanjiv Khanna said.

The judges rejected the plea to return to paper ballots.

The court, however, passed two directions to the poll body in this regard.

The first...