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topicnews · September 20, 2024

Former CEC: Some policies of ‘One Nation, One Election’ report are ‘flawed’ | India News

Former CEC: Some policies of ‘One Nation, One Election’ report are ‘flawed’ | India News

Dr. SY Quraishi, former CEC | Photo: PTI

3 minutes reading time Last updated: September 20, 2024 | 6:23 p.m. IS

After the government set the ball rolling for simultaneous elections, former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi raised concerns about the feasibility and impact of the proposed move, saying some key recommendations were “flawed” and stressed the need for a debate in Parliament on the issues.

The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the recommendations of a high-level committee chaired by former President Ram Nath Kovind to hold simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha, state assemblies and local bodies in a phased manner after a nationwide consensus-building exercise.

The move sparked a nationwide debate, with opposition parties calling it impractical and a “cheap trick” by the ruling BJP.

The One Nation One Election report claimed that more than 80 percent of the 21,558 responses received supported the proposal.

Quraishi described several of the report’s key recommendations as “flawed.”

He pointed out that in the simultaneous elections, the panchayat elections, which involve a significant number of local elected officials, would not be held.

“The entire country is being roiled by simultaneous elections while over 300,000 elected representatives at the local level are being ignored,” he told PTI Videos.

The report suggested that the panchayat elections would be held separately within a period of 100 days, a move which, according to the former CEC, goes against the essence of simultaneous elections.

“Holding separate elections just a few months apart will pose significant logistical challenges and lead to voter fatigue,” he warned.

The Election Commission has said that to conduct simultaneous elections, three times the number of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and Voter Verified Paper Audit Trails (VVPATs) are required.

This means a need for about 40 lakh additional machines and poses significant financial and logistical hurdles, Quraishi said.

“And one point in favour of simultaneous elections is that at all three levels, the voter is the same, the polling booths are the same and the people conducting the polling are the same… Now the Election Commission has identified a logistical problem, which is that it will need three times as many EVMs and VVPATs. Do the math, it will require thousands of crore rupees,” he pointed out.

Given these challenges, Quraishi stressed the importance of a debate in Parliament and urged lawmakers to address these practical issues. “For villagers, local governance is more important than national politics. If they cannot vote for logistical reasons, their voice will be silenced.”

The former CEC also stressed the constitutional requirements for implementing the proposal. Any amendment would require a majority vote in both houses of Parliament as well as ratification by at least half of the states, a process that could prove complex and contentious.

Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw stressed on Wednesday that parties across the political spectrum had indeed supported the “One Nation, One Election” initiative.

“This is an issue that will strengthen democracy and government-to-state relations, ensure faster growth of the nation and remove obstacles that stand in the way of our country’s growth,” he added.

(Only the headline and image of this report may have been edited by Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First published: September 20, 2024 | 6:23 p.m. IS

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