India has been impacted by various electoral malpractices such as Criminality, Money Power, Illicit use of state machinery. This eventually leads to various mechanisms for rigging the polls such as duplicate voters, booth capturing etc.  Over the years the election commission has introduced various reforms such as introduction of photographs on the electoral rolls etc. however such malpractices still continue. In this regard, the union government has introduced three reforms.

1. Common electoral rolls for Vidhan Sabha and panchayat elections,
2. Extending the qualifying date for registration of young new voters, and
3. Linking of Aadhaar with electoral rolls

The importance of Common electoral roll:

• To prevent corruption in Local polls - A common experience has been the stuffing of bogus voters in the panchayat/municipal rolls. This perhaps happens because becoming a panchayat member has become extremely lucrative since the panchayats started getting crores as funds after the PRI Act, 1993. Corrupt practices are proportionately higher in PRI polls.
• Economic reason - Duplication of efforts: The process of making electoral rolls requires manpower from all governmental departments. A major chunk of the work falls on schoolteachers. Their involvement in non-teaching work takes its toll.
• Ease of implementation: The only difference between the PRI and Vidhan Sabha rolls is that the former has information about the ward in which the voter lives. The enumerator (usually the Booth Level Officer) knows the ward number of each home. The roll-making machinery stays the same. All that the enumerator needs to do is to write it in an additional column, which will be masked for state legislature elections and unmasked for PRIs where elections are conducted ward-wise.

Importance of  Extending the qualifying date for registration of young new voters - a recommendation by Sushil Modi committee - A committee of the Ministry of Law and Justice under Sushil Kumar Modi has proposed quarterly cut-off dates for voter registration — January 1, April 1, July 1 and October 1. Why Linking of Aadhar?

• Removing bogus/duplicate voters: some electors may be registered in more than one constituency and that non-citizens have been enrolled.
• Keeping a track of same person voting in someone else's name: This can be prevented due to biometric authentication.
• No possibility of booth capture: As a person with unique biometrics can caste only single vote.
• Remote voting: This can also allow for remote voting, a measure that could help migrant voters.
• Faster enrolment: The four qualifying dates for revision of rolls will help in faster enrolment of those who turn 18.

Issues with the bill

• Exclusion errors - Possible disenfranchisement of legitimate voters unwilling or unable to submit Aadhaar details, leading to violation of universal suffrage under Article 326. It is difficult to enrol 90 crore voters.
• Inclusion errors - Aadhaar cannot differentiate between citizen & Non citizen: In fact, the Aadhaar database may be irrelevant to verify voter identity because it is an identifier of residents and not citizens.
• Possibility of misuse of demographic details: It may be used for profiling of voters by parties. In absence of data protection law, such integration can undermine integrity of electoral roll. Misuse of demographic information by the government for targeted advertising or possible deletion from electoral rolls.
• Scope of fraud within Aadhaar system: there have been complaints of wrongful enrolment have come up even against the unique identity number allotted to more than 90% of the population.
• Other ways to identify bogus voters: by other identification processes such as cross-matching the National electoral roll data held by the election commission of India.

These proposals are long pending and recommended by the election commission in the past.  Although some precautions might be necessary given that the Aadhaar system is not foolproof. Further there are possibilities of exclusion of valid voters.