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It is the inherent and sovereign right and duty of every citizen to choose his / her representatives to serve the public. In a changing world, political participation is increasingly delinked from territorial location. Most countries extend franchise to external citizens. Several countries facilitate exercise of franchise through postal ballots (US, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Canada and UK) or at embassies and consulates (Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, France, Russia, Sweden, Philippines, Japan, Dominican Republic and Spain), or through internet voting (France).
That is why we all should strongly and unequivocally support the right of NRIs to exercise their franchise.
People For Loksatta (PFL), in collaboration with several public spirited NRIs and resident Indians along with dozens of civil society organizations, has been at the forefront of advocating the cause of providing voting and contesting rights to NRIs. |
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A Bill to amend Section 20 of The Representation of the People Act, 1950 has been introduced in Indian Parliament (Rajya Sabha) in 2006. The Bill sought to extend voting rights to NRIs by treating them as ordinarily resident in India for voting purposes. It also sought to provide NRIs the right to contest in elections and become public representatives.
On June 10, 2010 this draft of The Representation of the People (Amendment) Bill, 2006 was approved by the Group of Ministers (GoM), Government of India. Now, this Bill is reportedly sought to be cleared by the Union Cabinet for introduction in the forthcoming, monsoon session of the Parliament.
These are welcome steps towards providing the rights to vote and contest in elections, to Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) across the world. |
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No provision for Absentee Voting.
It is reported (as informed by the Overseas Indian Affairs Minister, Vayalar Ravi) widely in print media that the Government is contemplating that the NRIs be allowed to exercise their vote only if they are physically present in their respective constituencies at the time of elections. This does not offer a practical solution to the manner of effecting the voting rights of NRIs.
The requirement of physical presence at the time of voting would place enormous constraints on the NRIs seeking to exercise their franchise and thereby would effectively neutralize their right to vote sought to be given by the Bill. In effect, it would practically serve as a deterrent against the exercise of the right to vote by the NRIs. |
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