To enhance the quality of democracy in India the Election Commission of India has proposed electoral reforms in 2016. What are the suggested reforms and how far are they significant to make democracy successful?. (UPSC IAS Mains 2017 General Studies Paper – 2)
Electoral reform basically aims at introducing an electoral system of conducting free and fair elections. Keeping in view the necessity to strengthen democracy the Election Commission suggested significant reforms:
- Constitutional protection for all members of the election commission of India:ECI suggested that other election commissioners should also be protected in the same manner as Chief Election Commissioner is protected under clause (5) of Article 324.
- Budget of the commission to be ''charged'':Presently, the administrative expenditure of the Commission is a voted expenditure. The Commission sent a proposal that the expenditure of the Commission should be charged/ non-votable expenditure on the Consolidated Fund of India similar to other constitutional bodies.
- Independent Secretariat:The Commission proposes that it should have an independent Secretariat along the lines of the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha and Registries of the Supreme Court and High Courts.
- Proxy voting:Section 60 of The Representation of the People Act, 1951 should be amended to provide overseas electors the alternative option of proxy voting or postal ballot voting.
- The Commission proposes that making of any false statement or declaration before the Election Commission should be an electoral offence.
- The Commission has proposed amendments and suggested dividing the seats in the Council of States and State Legislative Councils into three categories and specifying the term for each category in such a way that biennial retirement of 1/3rd of the members would be ensured.
- Use of totalizer for counting of votes:EVM totalizer can count votes of multiple Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) simultaneously. This way the results of votes in a group of EVMs can be taken without ascertaining the result in individual EVM corresponding to polling booth.
- Persons charged with cognizable offences shall be de-barred from contesting in the elections, at the stage when the charges are framed by the competent court provided the offence is punishable by imprisonment of at least 5 years, and the case is filed at least 6 months prior to the election in question.
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