Union Cabinet Approves Bill for Electoral Reforms, Linking Aadhar Cards with Voters ID
NEW DELHI, Dec 15: The Union Cabinet on Wednesday cleared a bill on electoral reforms bringing key amendments to reform the electoral process based on the Election Commission’s recommendations. Four major reforms are being introduced to strengthen the electoral rolls, make the voting process more inclusive, give more power to the EC, and weed out duplicates.
Just like PAN-Aadhaar linking, seeding of the Aadhaar card with one’s voter ID or electoral card will now be allowed. However, unlike the former, this is being done on a voluntary basis, in accordance with the right to privacy judgment of the Supreme Court and a test of proportionality.
Official sources said the reforms would allow the Election Commission to seed the Aadhaar number with electoral rolls on a voluntary basis. According to the bill, the electoral law will be made “gender-neutral” for service voters. Another provision of the bill will allow new voters to enroll on four different cut-off dates every year. As of now, those turning 18 on or before January 1 of every year are only allowed to register as voters.
In August 2019, the Election Commission proposed amendments including linking of the ID card with Aadhaar number to curb multiple enrollments of the same individual at different places. This has been a long-pending proposal of the Election Commission. In 2015, when the EC launched the National Electoral Law Purification and Authentication Programme to link the Aadhaar number with the Voter ID number, the programme was stalled after the Supreme Court ordered that the use of Aadhaar would be optional for availing of welfare schemes.
According to reports, the law ministry started working on the proposal in 2020 when Ravi Shankar Prasad was the minister. In August this year, minister Kiren Rijiju informed Parliament that the government was considering the EC’s proposal. “After consulting various stakeholders, the Commission submitted its 244th and 255th Reports encompassing various aspects of electoral reforms which, inter alia, include disqualification from contesting election on framing of charges, regulation of election finance and opinion polls, ban on paid news etc,” the minister had said in a written reply.
According to the EC, pilot projects conducted by it have been very positive and successful, and this step would weed out duplication and strengthen the electoral rolls.
(Manas Dasgupta)
