Updated: December 1, 2020 8:01:05 am
According to rough estimates, there are around 1 crore of Indians settled abroad, of whom around 60 lakh could be of voting age.
More than a year after the Bill who proposed To extend proxy voting to Indians abroad that expired with the dissolution of the 16th Lok Sabha, the Electoral Commission (EC) has approached the government to allow non-resident Indians (NRI) to cast their votes through ballots. postcards.
The Commission told the Ministry of Law last week that it is “technically and administratively ready” to extend the Electronically Transmitted Postal Vote System (ETPBS) to NRI voters for next year’s elections in Assam, West Bengal, Kerala. , Tamil Nadu and Puducherry.
Currently, voters residing abroad can only cast their vote in their respective electoral districts. This regulation is considered so restrictive as only a few thousand Indians living abroad have registered as voters, the maximum being Kerala.
According to rough estimates, there are around 1 crore of Indians settled abroad, of whom around 60 lakh could be of voting age. They could have a considerable influence on the election results, especially in states like Punjab, Gujarat and Kerala, where a number of expatriates hail from.
Under ETPBS, which is currently only available to service voters, the postal ballot is sent electronically and returned by regular mail. To extend this facility to overseas voters, the government only needs to amend the 1961 Rules of Conduct for Elections. It does not require the approval of Parliament.
Numbers to change the results
It is estimated that there are around 1 crore of Indians settled abroad, of which around 60 lakh could be of voting age. They could have a considerable influence on the election results, especially in states like Punjab, Gujarat and Kerala, where several expatriates come from.
In accordance with the Commission proposal received by the Ministry of Law, any NRI interested in voting by postal ballot in an election must inform the Return Officer (RO) at least five days after notification of the election . Upon receiving such information, the RO will send the ballot electronically. NRI voters will mark their preference on the hard copies of the ballot and submit it along with a statement certified by an official designated by the diplomatic or consular representative of India in the country where the NRI resides.
It is not clear, at this time, whether the voter will return the ballot by regular mail or deliver it to the Indian Embassy, which can then separate the envelopes by constituency and send them to the Election Director of the state in question. for post-RO transmission.
It was in 2014 that the EC accepted the proposal to allow NRI voters to cast their votes, after receiving several requests, including one from MP Rajya Sabha and industrialist Naveen Jindal and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
During its consultations with political parties and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MEA) on voting by mail for NRIs, the latter has expressed strong reservations about attesting to the statement that voters will be required to send along with their marked ballot papers.
The MEA had said that “diplomatic missions do not have the logistical means to handle the certification of large numbers of voters abroad” and that they would have to request permission from the host country to organize such activity, which can be difficult in countries democratic.
Among political parties, only the National Congress Party has expressed its full support for the EC for voting by mail for the NRIs. According to the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Bhartiya Janata Party, and the Communist Party of India, postal ballots were not a viable option due to lack of time. The congressional party was not in favor of sending the ballot by email.
In 2015, after consultations, the EC wrote to the government proposing proxy voting (the voter appoints a representative to vote on their behalf) and postal ballots for Indians residing abroad. In 2018, the government tried to grant proxy voting rights to overseas voters through an amendment to the People’s Representation Act of 1951. The bill was approved by the Lok Sabha and was awaiting approval from the Rajya Sabha when it expired with the dissolution of the 16th Lok. Sabha. In its letter last week, the EC lobbied only for mail-in voting rights for NRIs, not proxy voting.
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