20/02/2020 - Indian Polity

KEY POINTS

·        The Election Commission of India (ECI) is collaborating with the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M), to work on technology that would allow voters to exercise their democratic right through a digital device..

·        The current dispensation at the Centre has talked of making it easier for NRIs eligible to vote in Indian elections to register their electoral opinion—at present, they can only cast their vote at the Indian embassy in the country of their residence.

·        A legislation to allow proxy voting for NRIs also didn’t get much traction in Parliament. Digital voting will help overcome the problems of distance for NRI voters, and hesitations over proxy on part of the Indian legislature.

·        It could even allow migrant workers within the country to cast their votes in polls in their native constituencies.

·        Blockchain technology will ensure that voter identity is established while the vote is anonymised. This is the first time India will be experimenting with such technology.

·        India can tap into the Aadhaar database, which has biometric information if voter ID cards are linked to the unique ID.

·        The level of representation such digitally-mediated voting can facilitate, and the cost savings this could mean—from the drastically reduced need for security and other personnel deployment, booths, voting machines, power back-up, etc, especially in remote areas—make this an attractive proposition.

·        However, the ECI must ensure that the system inspires the voters’ faith; there will be doubts about whether the system is hack-proof and doesn’t allow interference by enemy interests, whether it will preserve anonymity of the vote, and perhaps even whether the system will function as envisioned.

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