Free and Fair Election is the main pillar of democracy. But election must be inclusive and those participating must be genuine. Hence our electoral rolls and the process of participation in this mega process of democracy must be free from all sorts of errors and at the same time it should be convenient , easy, inspiring and informative.
1.With advancing technology and to bring ease in the process of conducting elections Voter Id card should be mapped with aadhar no (along with the options to map with passport, PAN etc and mobile no) . The rational is to have more and more credible database.
2. The voter card should be made universal in nature so that we need not need to keep it changing with changing constituency. This will reduce the bulk of work for election comission and above two steps will help eliminate duplicate and multiple voter identity cards.
3. The manual electoral rolls should be gradually abolished and a voter should be free to exercise his/her right to vote once in a 5 year for one type of election.(.i.e A voter "A" can choose different constituency for different elections - state or National or Panchayat level) For this voters should be allowed to register their presence for a given constituency. The process for the same may be initiated 6 months prior to election due constituency. This should be achieved through some electronic platform (dedicated site or application) created for the purpose and should be done by the voters themselves. The same should be authorised at back end by concerned officer based on the information.
4. With the mapping of voter id with aadhar , the presence of voters can be recorded through biometric machines which will authenticate the eligibility of voter and his/her credentials. This will not only eliminate rigging in elections but reduce work load. Also the election progress and participation can be monitored on real time basis.
5. The election comission should also provide to its voter "electronic election book " and the same should record his/her participation. Every participation, right from the day of becoming a voter till his death, should be recorded and preserved. The book will of course not record the choice made by the voter during his voting but only his presence.. date , constituency and type of election. Even the absence of the voter from his/her chosen constituency should be recorded.
6. To promote participation the EC can provide score card for participating in any election.
7. The EC should ask all the political parties to file affidavit with regard to their promises made in election manifestos along with clear road map to achieve the same. Any other promise during election process other than declared in manifesto and affidavit should not be allowed.
© Amit kumar pandey
