Supreme Court seeks response from Election Commission on plea to introduce e-voting, OTP based identification of voters, expanding postal ballot

The Supreme Court on Thursday sought the response of the Election Commission of India and Central government on a plea seeking introduction of e-voting by means of a "secured remote electronic voting system" which would allow citizens to cast their vote virtually..The petition filed by a native of Kerala, K Sathyan, represented by advocate Kaleeswaram Raj, said the electoral law needs to be brought in tune with the modern times and technology..The petition also sought directions to ensure fairer election process by providing double databases for transactions namely, central database and a local database to reduce chances of manipulation of data and Electronic Voting Machines (EVM).The petition further prayed that an OTP based system for fault free identification of voters be evolved and also sought installation of CCTVs in all polling booths across the country..The plea said that students, NRIs, migrant workers and employees cannot be deprived of their right to vote merely because they are unable to be physically present in their respective constituencies. The term ‘postal ballot’ under the Representation of People Act needs to be expanded and the Supreme Court needs to intervene in this regard, it was submitted..“Several sections of voters including internal migrant labourers, employees, students and business professionals stationed outside the constituency as well as Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) and overseas migrant labourers on account of their profession, occupation, education, trade, business, marriage etc have been alienated from the electoral process for very long,” the petition stated..Depriving them of their right to vote is in violation of the Constitutional obligation of the State to protect the praxis of free and fair elections, the petitioner contended.Currently, voting through postal ballot can be availed only by a few categories of persons. The same should be expanded to include all registered voters who are unable to come back to their constituency including internal migrant labourers, business persons, students, NRIs and their spouses, the petitioner prayed..A Bench of Chief Justice of India SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian initially expressed apprehension on whether to entertain the plea.."What kind of plea is this? Sitting in England you will vote here ? If you can't care enough to go to your constituency why should law help you," the CJI remarked at one point. .Plea filed in Supreme Court to expand postal ballot, introduce e-voting and OTP based identification of voters, install CCTVs at polling booths.The plea prayed for expanding the access of citizens to electoral process by enhancing exiting postal ballot voting to more categories of citizens. Towards this end, the petition objected to certain statutory prescriptions under the Representation of People Act.First, it sought an expansion of the scope of the term “certain other classes” occurring in Section 60 of the Representation of People Act to includes persons stationed outside their constituency.Second, it also sought reading down of the provision “not in any other manner” other than postal ballot under Section 60 (c) of the RP Act so that other modes of voting can be explored."Logistic concerns cannot curtail voting rights ... Insistence of physical presence violates the right to equality ... Exclusion of significant part of the population stationed outside their constituencies amounts to massive deprivation of the right to practice democratic process,” said the petition drawn by Advocates Aruna A, Thulasi K Raj, Maitreyi S Hegde, Minu VP, Tellmy Jolly and Uttara PV.It was also submitted said a “double database” should be put in use to store the transactions in electronic voting machines (EVMs). This means that there should be a central database and a local one. The double guard would drastically reduce the chance for manipulation of data and EVMs, it was contended. .The petition also said CCTVs should be installed in polling booths. It was also prayed that assisted voting for the blind and the physically infirm ought to be made foolproof under the Conduct of Election Rules of 1961. People who guide them inside the booths should either be close relatives or election officials.“Free elections form part of the basic structure of the Constitution,” the petition said.