New Delhi, February 29
The Election Commission today tried to hardsell its proposal for providing the “right of rejection” to the electorate while exercising franchise.
“We had sent the proposal sometime back and we hope the Centre takes a positive decision on it,” Chief Election Commissioner T.S. Krishna Murthy told newspersons here.
“The electorate should have the right to reject all candidates contesting the poll if they are not satisfied with the political parties’ selection of candidates,” he said.
In the proposal, which has been pending with the Law Ministry for quite some time, the EC had suggested introduction of a column “none of the above”, which would give an opportunity for the electorate to reject all candidates contesting to represent a constituency.
The CEC hoped that the government would try to arrive at a consensus by holding all party meetings and also debating the issue in other public forums.
Congress spokesperson Abshiek Manu Singhvi said the commission’s proposal of giving the voter the right to reject the candidate was a “good idea and would strengthen democracy.”
Acknowledging the fact that the commission had sent the proposal sometime back, he said there had been no occasion for the party to take a formal stand on this issue and it would be discussed in the party forum after the poll.
BJP spokesperson Prakash Javdekar said the proposal would have significance in those countries where voting is compulsory. In our country only 50 per cent of the electorate exercise their franchise, indicating that the remaining others, except for those who could not exercise due to unavoidable reasons, have virtually expressed their opinion to the contrary.
Stating that the BJP has not discussed the issue at
the party level, he said the academic issue should be discussed as part of the comprehensive electoral reform process.
Rejecting the commission’s proposal outrightly, senior CPM leader Somnath Chatterjee said such a provision would result in chaos and that would be the end of parliamentary democracy in the country.
National Secretary of the CPI D Raja said the political parties have not been consulted on this issue so far.
The mere fact that only 50 to 55 per cent of the electorate go to poll itself indicates that the remaining voters are rejecting the candidates put up by the political parties.
Proportional representation, right to recall and Presidential form of government are some of the measures that have been suggested by political parties as part of the electoral reform process.
