Last Update: February 03, 2023, 18:03 IST
The term of the current law panel ends at the end of this month. Government sources have indicated that the three-year tenure of the panel may be extended.(@KirenRijiju/Twitter/File)
Law Minister Kiren Rijiju said that the Election Commission has also informed that RVM is not proposed for use by NRI voters.
There is no proposal to use Remote Electronic Voting Machines (RVMs) in the “forthcoming elections” in the country and it is also not proposed for use by Non-Resident Indian (NRI) voters, the Lok Sabha was informed on Friday.
In response to a question in the lower house of Parliament, Law Minister Kiren Rijiju said in a written reply that Election Commission (EC), it has “not proposed to introduce RVM for the upcoming election in the country”.
Several assembly elections are due this year, while the Lok Sabha elections will be held in 2024.
The Minister said that the Election Commission has also informed that RVM is not proposed for the use of NRI voters.
Rijiju said that the public sector unit Electronic Corporation of India Ltd. (ECIL) has developed a prototype of Multi Constituency Remote Electronic Voting Machine under the guidance of Technical Expert Committee of Election Commission and Poll Panel.
He said the Election Commission had circulated a concept note to all national and state political parties on improving voter participation of domestic migrants using remote voting.
The note included matters such as defining ‘overseas voter’, addressing the territorial concept, method of remote voting and counting of votes, implementing the model code of conduct and setting up a controlled environment to ensure free and fair polling.
Citing details shared by the Election Commission, he said the introduction of RVM will not increase bogus votes. “The prototype RVM developed by ECIL is a robust and stand-alone system based on the existing EVM…independently, various statutes – the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and the Representation of the People Act, 1951, Conduct of Election Rules and various Election Commission guidelines and The instructions shall ensure that the confirmation/verity of the voter identity is verified.”
Chief Election Commissioner Rajeev Kumar had last month described the EC’s proposal on remote voting as a “work in progress” and said it is not an easy subject and decision making in a democracy takes time.
Responding to questions on the recent all-party consultation on remote voting, he had said it was “successful” with representatives of recognized parties sitting throughout the day. The issue of 30 crore “missing voters” came into limelight.
Kumar had said that urban voters, youth and domestic migrants were among the 300 million voters who did not participate in the last Lok Sabha elections.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)