electoral roll

The Election Commission should let accredited data analysts scrutinise the Draft Supplementary Electoral Roll (RDPT) to ensure it is free of anomalies, electoral watchdog Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (Bersih 2.0) said today.

Summary: Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], Apr 15 (ANI): With Karnataka Election Commission brand ambassador Rahul Dravid's name missing from the voters' list, the state's top election officer on Monday said that the former cricketer changed his residence and did not do the needful to get him included in the electoral roll.

It also included an amendment filed by the Greens allowing anyone with a Republic of Cyprus identity card living on the island to vote in the European Parliament elections without having to register on the electoral roll.

Head of the electoral service Demetris Demetriou has told CAN that automatic inclusion in the electoral roll would be impossible for the upcoming European elections since the time left until May is too short.

'On the application of a candidate or their election agent, the district election commissioner or any officer authorised in this behalf by the commission shall provide to a candidate or an election agent a hard and searchable soft copy on universal serial bus (USB) [drive] in portable document format (PDF) or any other tamper-proof format of the final electoral roll with photographs of the voters and shall ensure that the copy is the same as provided to the returning officer and presiding officers,' reads sub-section 3 of Section 79.

One of the officials referred to Section 79(3) of the Elections Act that reads 'On the application of a candidate or his election agent, the district election commissioner or any officer authorised on his behalf by the Commission shall provide to a candidate or an election agent a hard and searchable soft copy on universal serial bus (USB) in portable document format (PDF) or any other tamper-proof format of the final electoral roll with photographs of the voters and shall ensure that the copy is the same as provided to the Returning Officer and Presiding Officers'.

"Under Section 20A of the Representation of People Act, 1950 and rules made thereunder, every citizen of India - (a) whose name is not included in the electoral roll; (b) who has not acquired the citizenship of any other country; and (c) who is absent from his place of ordinary residence in India owing to his employment, education or otherwise outside India, is entitled to have his/her name registered in the electoral roll as an 'overseas elector' in the constituency in his/her place of residence in India as mentioned in his/her passport.

After getting enrolled in the electoral roll, NRIs can cast their vote in India during assembly or parliamentary elections at the respective polling station after showing his/her valid Indian passport,' the embassy said.

He advised the citizens to avail opportunity to get corrected electoral roll as April 30 would be last day for the correction.

In the final electoral roll, there are a total of 432,030 registered eligible voters for the third National Council elections.

The Electoral Reform Society, which campaigns for open and fair democracy, hit out at the authorities' refusal to say to whom and how often information from the electoral roll was being sold.