Chennai: With cash for votes, freebie culture and caste oppression haunting the concept of free and fair polls across the country, a senior IAS officer in Tamil Nadu who had toured Uttar Pradesh, Kashmir, Bihar as a central observer for Election Commission of India has recommended two simple steps to make elections, a foolproof democratic exercise.
First is to make polling, a month long exercise, second along with the manual voting give the option of online voting which can be done through mobile phone or desktops.
The officer in the ranks of a secretary also shared about his communication with ECI in which the former Chennai district election officer has suggested that a lot of money and political tension can be alleviated, if online voting introduced.
“When you can safely transfer money through online transactions why not online voting” wonders the officer. The traditional method of voting can also be there, but a polling window period of one month will bring down the incidence of cash inducement. All the state has to do is heavily guard polling stations. In fact, if there is a software developed even nationalised bank ATMs and post offices can be converted into polling stations. The beauty will be no one will know whether the public are voting or doing cash transactions, the tech savvy official said. Further the election commission of India should not rely on state resources to conduct the polls.
The postal ballot voters do not have option to change their vote once cast. Also their head of office has to identify the voters and certify accordingly, the official added.
Suggestions for free and fair polls
Make poling prolong for a period of one month and the polling stations can be post office or nationalized ATMS, with software embedded EVMs or even the ATM machines can be enhanced with software upgrdation to serve as EVMs. Encourage online voting through Aadhaar based identification. All electoral rolls should be linked to Aadhaar. This would incidentally do away with people having multiple votes and eliminate impersonation. A third party should be appointment to monitor the online counting process and the option to change the choice of votes should also be given to a voter during the window period. At present the actual polling for uniformed personnel through postal votes enjoys such safety and window period and this has to be extended to the public.
