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Voters ID cards and voting

Prashant Solomon

Posted on December 2, 2003

Yesterday, four Indian states - Delhi, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh went to the polls to elect their new state legislative assemblies. This election is what many are calling the 'semi finals' before the next Lok Sabha polls scheduled to be held sometime in 2004. Voting is one of the Fundamental Rights enshrined in the Constitution of India, however, not everyone who wanted to vote got a chance to.

Back in 1993-1994, the Voters ID card was introduced in order to provide genuine voters a form of identification. The Government of India urged all citizens to get a Voters ID card made. People were called to a particular place (in my case, the community centre in Golf Links, New Delhi) and a picture was taken of them and presto, they received a brand new laminated Voters ID card - that was supposed to guarantee them the right to cast their vote in all elections - Assembly and Lok Sabha.

However, despite introducing Voters ID cards, the old system of the polling list was still intact as well. Basically what this meant was that a few weeks or months prior to any major election, volunteers come to the residence of voters and confirm names that are in their records.

Sometimes a voters name appears on the list when the volunteers come calling, but myseriously disappears at the time of polling.

Yesterday, after casting my vote in the Golf Links community centre, I went around the Assembly constituencies with other Congress(I) party workers and saw upfront the anguish on the faces of genuine, bonifide and registered voters who had a valid Voters ID card, but were not allowed to vote because of their names being 'missing' from the list.

In the Gole Market Assembly Constituency, where Delhi Chief Minister Smt. Sheila Dikshit was elected from in 1998, there were many voters who weren't allowed to vote because their names were not in the list. Christabella Alexander, a 60 year old social worker affiliated with the Congress(I) party was denied her constitutional right to vote because her name was not in the voters list.

Another man tore up his Voters ID card and threw it away saying, "What is the point of this card? I have it, still I am not being allowed to vote because my name is not on the list. I stood in a long line for hours trying to get that card made, but there is no point of keeping it now." The man was denied his right to vote simply because of some mistake that some volunteer or some data entry operator in the Election Commission of India made.

This is not the first election when this has happened either. But despite that, no solution has been found as yet. There needs to be a more foolproof system wherein a voter will have the right to vote even if their name for some vague reason does not appear on the list.