Election Commission of India to Carry Out Electoral Reforms
Election Commission of India (ECI) held detailed discussions on Tuesday (February 18) with the Legislative Department of Ministry of Law and Justice on various issues of pending electoral reforms.
Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora, Election Commissioners Ashok Lavasa, Sushil Chandra, and senior officers of ECI met Narayan Raju, Secretary of the Department, along with Mrs Rita Vashishth, Additional Secretary and other officers at the meeting.
While welcoming the Law Secretary and other officers of the Ministry, CEC Sunil Arora thanked the Department for facilitating postal ballot facilities for electors of above 80 years and electors belonging to essential services by the recent amendment in the Conduct of Election Rules on ECI’s recommendation.
[ Also Read: Appeal for Open Government in Delhi ]
Arora also mentioned that there are more than 40 different proposals of electoral reforms which are pending since long and Commission is at present discussing some of these proposals. “Commission would like to have such meetings with Legislative Department at regular intervals to pursue all such pending proposals,” he said.
Matters discussed during the meeting included more than one qualification date in an year for becoming elector; Aadhaar linkage with electoral roll; paid news and false affidavit as electoral offence / corrupt practice; print media and social media intermediaries to be covered under Section 126 of the RP Act 1951; substituting the term ‘wife’ by ‘spouse’ in the RP Act 1951 to facilitate electoral registration to the spouse of women service officials in the category of service voter; amendment in Contribution Form.
