New Delhi: Ashis Ray, president of the Indian Journalist Association’s (IJA) European chapter, who organised a press conference in London last month to show how electronic voting machines can be hacked, sought to clarify his stand in New Delhi Thursday. However, Ray faced fire from a member of his own association, who questioned his intent and accused him of not informing IJA’s executive committee about the London event.
Ray had invited a man named Syed Shuja (whom Ray’s statement referred to as Syed Hyder Ahmad), purportedly a US-based engineer who claimed he had worked on Indian EVMs and said he could demonstrate how it can be hacked.
The press conference was organised on 21 January, with Shuja appearing via video conferencing and making startling claims about the BJP “rigging” the 2014 general elections. But he failed to hack the EVM.
Ray said “he [Shuja] was far from the expectation he had raised about his ability to prove that EVMs were not impregnable”.
However, Poonam Joshi, a London-based correspondent for ABP News and a member of the IJA, began questioning Ray about “misleading” the association, saying the executive committee was not informed about the press conference.
Also read: India should put the EVM hacking debate to rest and here’s how
Questions on Sibal’s presence
“How does one determine that you did due diligence before conducting the conference and whether your actions were not a hand-in-glove association with the Congress party?” she asked, echoing the questions raised at the time on the presence of senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal at the London event.
Joshi also questioned in what capacity the press conference was organised when the job of the IJA was only to protect the rights of Indian journalists reporting from the United Kingdom.
Ray denied her accusations and said: “There are certain matters that are internal matters of the IJA and therefore I will not discuss them. At an executive committee meeting, this matter was discussed and the process of due diligence was discussed with them. The secretary, treasurer, executive committee and the general body of the IJA were well-informed regarding the press conference.”
On being asked repeatedly about Sibal’s presence, Ray said: “Kapil Sibal was present there in his personal capacity and did not represent the Indian National Congress. In hindsight, his presence at the conference distracted the people from the real issue.”
Ray lashes out
When an argument broke out between the two, a hassled Ray lashed out at Joshi, saying: “You are not a member of the executive committee, so you do not have a say.”
Ray repeatedly asked Joshi to not discuss the matters of the IJA in an open forum. Fellow journalists present at the conference sided with Joshi when Ray tried to stop her from “discussing the internal matters”.
The IJA and the Foreign Press Association had jointly organised the London press conference. However, the FPA distanced itself immediately after the conference, when it failed to establish anything concrete.
Also read: Kapil Sibal’s defence — all allegations of EVM hacking can be verified, so let’s do that