{"id":213157,"date":"2022-11-05T19:25:31","date_gmt":"2022-11-05T13:55:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=213157"},"modified":"2022-11-05T19:25:31","modified_gmt":"2022-11-05T13:55:31","slug":"remote-voting-shorter-term-overseas-migrants-should-be-able-to-avail-the-postal-ballot-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/remote-voting-shorter-term-overseas-migrants-should-be-able-to-avail-the-postal-ballot-system\/","title":{"rendered":"Remote voting-Shorter term overseas migrants should be able to avail the postal ballot system"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Source<\/span><\/b>: The post is based on the article <\/span>\u201cRemote voting-Shorter term overseas migrants should be able to avail the postal ballot system\u201d <\/span><\/b>published in <\/span>The Hindu <\/span><\/b>on <\/span>5th November 2022<\/span><\/b>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Syllabus: <\/span><\/b>GS2- Salient features of the Representation of People Act<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Relevance<\/span><\/b>: Voting system.<\/span><\/p>\n

News: <\/span><\/b>The article explains the issue of allowing <\/span>postal ballot facility<\/span><\/b> to overseas citizens.<\/span> This is important as <\/span>India has a large diaspora population of 1.35 crore.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is the present voting system for overseas citizens?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h5>\n

Currently, ECI allows enrolled overseas citizens to vote in person at the constituency where they are registered as a voter.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What are the issues with the present system?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h5>\n

The necessity to vote in person and the costs associated with overseas citizens have acted as a disincentive for their wanting to exercise their mandate. This was evident in the numbers of such voters in the 2019 Lok Sabha election. It was 25606 against 99,844 registered electors.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is the stand of ECI?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h5>\n

In 2014, a committee constituted by the ECI to probe methods to enable overseas voters\u2019 mandates concluded that <\/span>proxy voting<\/span><\/b> was the most viable. Some political parties objected to the idea.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A Bill was passed in the 16th Lok Sabha to enable proxy voting but it lapsed.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2020, the ECI approached the Government to permit NRIs to vote via <\/span>postal ballots<\/span><\/b>, similar to the system already used by service voters.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Why is allowing postal ballots a good move?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h5>\n

Several overseas countries allow this option to their overseas citizens. This is a better method of registering their vote rather than appointing a proxy. Proxy is allowed in case of service personnel who are limited in number. On other hand, NRIs are substantial in numbers.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 2014 discussion organised by the ECI, some parties raised a question, how NRIs<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>will get the benefit which is denied to internal migrant workers. But the higher costs of travel back to India, as opposed to travelling within justify this move<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source: The post is based on the article \u201cRemote voting-Shorter term overseas migrants should be able to avail the postal ballot system\u201d published in The Hindu on 5th November 2022.\u00a0 Syllabus: GS2- Salient features of the Representation of People Act\u00a0 Relevance: Voting system. News: The article explains the issue of allowing postal ballot facility to… Continue reading Remote voting-Shorter term overseas migrants should be able to avail the postal ballot system<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10311,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[212,10498],"class_list":["post-213157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-gs-paper-2","tag-the-hindu","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1704937152},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10311"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213157\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}