Why proxy voting has lessen in India?
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Answers
Answer:A large number of Indian citizens live abroad while studying, working or for other reasons. Until recently, these non-resident Indians (NRIs) were not registered to vote here due to the law, which required only an “ordinarily resident” citizen within the territorial limits of a constituency is eligible to be registered as a voter. On August 3, the government approved changes in electoral laws allowing NRIs to cast their vote for assembly and Lok Sabha elections from overseas through a proxy, with one caveat – the proxy could be appointed for only one poll. Until now only armed forces personnel were allowed to appoint proxies – they could appoint any adult living in the constituency as permanent proxies for all polls. Approximately one crore Indians are settled abroad, of whom about 60 lakhs are adults and are eligible to vote.
The idea of NRI voting goes back to 2013, when a sizeable group of Indians launched an initiative called the Bharatiya Pravasi Diwas. When their demand snowballed, then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, in his address to the 8th Bharatiya Pravasi Diwas in 2010, said that NRIs would be able to vote from the following year.
His announcement came out of the blue for the Election Commission (EC). Operational difficulties had neither been studied nor discussed. Just the thought of registering millions of voters and making arrangements for them to vote in the embassies and consulates was unnerving – not just for us at the EC but for the external affairs ministry as well.
To implement this promise, the Representation of the People Act 1950 was amended and came into effect on February 10, 2011, with a new section, Section 20A. This section made special provisions for every citizen of India residing outside the country to enrol themselves an electors, provided they had not acquired the citizenship of any other country and were otherwise eligible to be registered as a voter.
With great trepidation, the EC took up the challenge.
Elections to Kerala, Tamil Nadu and three other states were due within a month at that time. Only NRIs from Kerala registered – about 8500 people – and half of them turned up to vote as well. One NRI even contested the poll. The response in the other states, however, was less than desirable.
Proxy voting
The issue of proxy voting for NRIs came up in a public interest litigation in the Supreme Court in 2014. The Supreme Court asked the EC to initiate a committee to examine the proposal, following which the Committee for Exploring Feasibility of Alternative Options for Voting by Overseas Electors was set up. The EC looked at existing systems across the world and shortlisted four possible ones: voting in embassies, online voting, postal or e-postal ballot and proxy voting.
The EC then discussed the issue with all political parties. Based on the committee report, the BJP was of the view that voting through proxy could be considered as there would be no logistical problem involved. The BSP, the Communist Party of India and the Congress were not in favour of proxy voting as they said it could never be guaranteed that the proxy voter would vote as per the wishes of the actual voter. They also said that proxy voting suffered from the inherent problem of ‘trust deficiency’ and violated the principles of ‘secrecy of voting’ and ‘free and fair elections’.
The committee observed that the proxy voting facility would be a “convenient, efficacious and doable method” of providing voting facility to overseas electors. Since the appointment of the proxy can be made at any point of time, the issue of time constraint, the logistical issues of voting in the embassies and the related issue of seeking the host country’s permission were completely eliminated. The load on the returning officer and the election machinery would also be considerably less.
The committee ruled out the first two possibilities – voting in embassies and online voting – for logistical and technical reasons and zeroed in on the last two – postal ballots and proxy voting. The committee conclude that providing the proxy voting facility was operationally the most simple and viable option for facilitating voting by overseas electors. Regarding the issue of trust in the proxy raised by political parties, it is important to note that this issue is also applicable in the case of service voters who appoint proxies. It is expected that a person will appoint a proxy only when there is trust in the proxy.
The Supreme Court then asked the government to examine the proposals of the committee. On August 3, the government approved changes to the law to allow NRIs to vote through proxies.
Explanation:
Answer:
In 2003, India's People's Representative Act was amended to allow armed forces personnel to appoint a proxy to vote on their behalf.
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