No need for
a Holiday
It takes only few minutes to cast one's vote in an election.
There is no need for a government holiday. The employers should be
bound by a government order whereby the employee gets an hour's permission
from work so that he/she can cast his/her vote. Those who avail such
permission should produce the evidence of having cast their vote through
the black ink identity mark on their fingers and in case they could
not vote they must produce the slip endorsed by the Election Commission.
In order to facilitate this process, in the first few hours of voting
working people (both men and women) should be allowed to cast their
votes first. It is not at all impossible as we need to only work out
modalities to implement this facility for working men and women by
opening special counters. The only difficulty lies in identifying
the working people for which we need to design a foolproof mechanism.
Innovate to help People cast their Votes
If enrolling is made easier, and people are given a choice to reject
all candidates in an election and more than these in local body elections
if they are given a choice even to prefer a person who is not at all
a contestant, these factors should provoke and encourage everyone
to go to polling booths. The only hiccup now is the time factor. It
is impossible to handle all the voters (assuming close to 100% turn
out) within the 8 or 9 hours of polling time given the size of population
that we have in each constituency. For this the Election Commission
should give a serious thought and they can make it possible by increasing
the number of polling booths and by deploying large number of officials
on election duty. If we deploy large number of personnel in election
duty, the postal ballots should gain enhanced importance to that extent.
Another way is to think pragmatic and start the voting process at
6 a.m. and continue without break till 6 p.m. This would give additional
3-4 hours of time, which is almost 50% increase over the current polling
duration. With the current polling duration, if it is possible for
60% of the voters on an average to cast their votes, an increase of
another 50% in polling period would help in handling the remaining
40% of the voters. The only catch is that the indifferent voters have
to be influenced to take interest in the election process by implementing
the suggestions made above and also through many such concepts. If
need be, polling can continue the following morning at 6 a.m. if a
single day voting does not enable all 100% voters to cast their votes
on the same day. There is no sanctity to the norm of single day voting.
Election Commission should Facilitate Democracy
While appreciating Ms Pandyan for his bold suggestion, the officials
like him and also the Election Commission should try to answer some
of the following queries:
Does the election commission have plans to handle 100% turn out and
also does it have plans to reduce the election-related violence to
nil incidence?
Also, does the Election Commission have courage and conviction to
take proactive and progressive steps to bring in changes in our election
process?
When it has the courage to recommend the government not to announce
the election day as a holiday, would it also gain will and courage
to recommend the government to make the election process more in line
with people's expectation?
Would it gather guts to insist the legislators to add more teeth to
the People's Representation Act and other election-related laws?
Would it mobilize public opinion in favour of more representation
to women in legislative bodies?
Some may point finger at the author and say that many of these are
not the jobs of the Election Commission. They would be saying so based
on the way our Election Commission has functioned all through these
years. If it is one of the anchor bodies and a custodian of our democracy,
it should be more progressive and should not just confine its activities
to arrange for people's mandate. It should also facilitate people
to give their mandate and if needed find ways to encourage people
participation. If it does not do any of these and simply blame people
for enjoying the extra holiday, it would remain an excuse and not
a valid suggestion or a useful recommendation.
