Path-breaking and historical electoral reforms have been announced by the Election Commission of India. These reforms address in detail the scourge of cash for votes, EVM tampering etc. It hopes to put an end to all complaints related to pre-poll, poll and post-poll actions, violations etc.
These are the highlights:
1. Cash for votes: Unable to stop cash distribution during elections, The CEC and RBI have hit upon a novel solution. Accordingly all Political parties will be given demonetized 1000 Rs. and 500 Rs. demonetized notes.
The political parties can affix their respective party symbols right below the words “I promise to pay the bearer the sum of Rupees” and distribute the same to the voters. The number and value of the notes that a voter gets will reflect the actual value the voter will finally get for voting the particular party. There will be no limit to the number or value a voter can get; nor will there be a limit to the number of parties from which a voter can get these notes.
Since only demonetized notes are distributed it will not be illegal whereas distribution of legal tender amounts to illegality. This would ensure a level playing field for all contestants. The RBI need not burn the stock of demonetized notes and create environmental problems; nor it has to incur expenses in storage of these notes. It also speeds up the counting of the DM notes by putting the onus on the parties to count them. The ECI will be spared of the expense and efforts in deploying CCTV cameras, police personnel and poll observers to monitor cash distribution.
2. EVM hacking: Though the ECI has time and again proved the that EVMs cannot be tampered or rigged, no Political party is willing to accept it. Many parties have raised the issue of electoral victory, moral victory, political victory, tactical victory etc.
Similarly voters are also unhappy with present system. In the recently concluded Gujarat election many staunch BJP supporters did not vote for Congress because their conscience did not permit them to do so despite being unhappy with BJP. Either they stayed at home or voted for NOTA. Party spokespersons also complained that they were unable to convince Arnab or Rajdeep or Sreenivasan Jain as to who won the election and how.
Keeping in mind all these invaluable s inputs the ECI has announce that hence forth the following procedure will be adopted in future elections.
Each booth will have 5 EVMs and every voter will have the option to cast in any or all the five EVMs.
The EVMs will be designated as the Electoral Victor Machine, Moral Victor machine, Political victor machine, Tactical victor machine and “AOTA “ machine (All Of The Above).
With immediate effect NOTA option will be dispensed. Further category and nomenclature of EVM will be added as and when parties come up with more such ideas.
Effectively any voter can now vote for the BJP in one machine, AAP in another and Congress in another and opt for AOTA in the case for TTV Dinakaran!
This will give a psychological boost for the ordinary voter. He would have done full justice to his inner feelings in a Democratic way by pressing the desired buttons. The ECI has also invited suggestion from the general public for additional Victor options.
Tail Piece : AAP has strongly protested to the ECI saying that their supporters have complained that even they voted for AAP by pressing AOTA the vote was registered as NOTA.
