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10. Learned counsel for the plaintiffs further contends that admittedly, details of IP numbers of voters as well as the time for voting were masked, which further confirms that data provided by Nityam and EVote is not free from suspicion. Although, it has been submitted that the said exercise was done to ensure privacy of voters, however, it remains undisputed that data was not supplied in encrypted form and the same was tinkered with. This masking of the IP address as well as stamp is contrary to the Nityam's standard practice. According to the standard practice of Nityam audit trail CS(OS) 414/2020 Page GUPTA data of the voter after masking only few characters of the IP address and the time stamp is provided to the client when requested for to protect the voter's identity and privacy. However, in this case not only few characters of IP address and time stamp were masked but the entire IP address and time stamp were masked. Further Nityam has claimed that on defendant No.7's request Nityam provided the voter list, unmasking the complete IP address and only minutes of the time stamp remained semi masked. Further the data was to be immediately provided however, Nityam did not provide the data immediately, thus not ruling out possibility of tampering in the voting which is evident by the results which are very different from the previous past.

14. Learned counsel for Nityam and EVote contends that EVote which was incorporated only on 10th September, 2020 has nothing to do with the election process conducted by Nityam. The elections of defendant No.7 for the year 2020-2021 which is the subject matter of the suit has been conducted by Nityam. It is claimed that the EVote is one of the products of CS(OS) 414/2020 Page GUPTA Nityam and is an online web based election system, that is, SaaS (Software as a Service) platform. It is stated that the system of the Nityam is secure, transparent, easy to use and gives immediate and accurate voting result, saving valuable time and effort. It is denied that the Nityam has a tainted past record. In respect of the first election of Association of Surgeons of India (in short 'ASI') in 2017 one of the candidates had filed a suit even prior to the commencement of the e-voting process and the Madras High Court directed that the elections to be held for ASI be conducted by Nityam and was satisfied with the services of Nityam. As regards the second complaint of the unsuccessful candidate in relation to the elections of Indian Academy of Paediatrics, in the complaint filed before the Cyber Cell, Mumbai Police, no further action was taken as the complaint was frivolous and without any basis. In its reply affidavit, Nityam has also explained the procedure for conducting the elections through its platform and has claimed that the same is tamperproof. It is claimed that as per the standard practice, the data after masking a few characters of the IP address and a few characters of the time stamp is provided to the client when requested for, to protect the voter identity and privacy. It is necessary to mask the data for the reason the unmasked data would reveal the identity of the voter and for which candidate the said voter has cast its vote, which is in violation to the right of privacy of a voter. It is further claimed that masking of the voter details is similar to masking of credit cards details which is done to protect the misuse of the credit card. Nityam has stated that it is willing to file the unmasked data of the elections, that is, the audit trail of the candidates list and the voter list in a sealed cover, if directed by this Court.

22. Nityam has also stated about its past experience of providing the services of online elections, since the year 2014 and that it has held elections for number of associations such as Association of Medial Consultants, Karnataka State Obstetrics and Gynaecology Association, Indian Society of Assisted Reproduction, Indian Association of Paediatrics Surgeons, Urology Society of India, Association of Surgeons of India, Indian Academy of Paediatrics.

23. According to Nityam, in order to avoid mass voting from the same internet connection, Nityam is configured to validate only one public IP address which means that only one Public IP address can be used for casting vote throughout election process. According to Nityam raw data of the election is the encoded/encrypted and unprocessed data which cannot be understood by any human. The election data also consists of the Candidate Audit Trail and the Voter Audit Trail. The Audit Trail contains the time stamp of each vote in favour of the candidate however, the said data is not CS(OS) 414/2020 Page GUPTA Signing Date:16.02.2021 11:35:33 given to anybody and everybody to protect voter identity and privacy. Therefore, after masking only few characters of the IP address and the time stamp, the data is provided to the client when requested for.