Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Nasim Zaidi on Wednesday said that assessment of the requirement of security forces, climate and exam schedule is currently on to fix the poll schedule for holding Assembly elections in the States of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Goa, Manipur, and Uttarakhand.
While a decision is yet to be taken in this regard, CEC told reporters that the final call on the dates of Assembly elections will be based on the inputs provided by security forces and State law and order machinery. He was speaking on the sidelines of an international conference on voter awareness in the Capital.
The term of the UP Assembly will end in May next year while elections are due in remaining four States where the Assembly tenure ends in March 2017. Clearing the air on an early announcement of election dates to the poll-bound States, CEC said, “We are trying to assess the requirement of security forces, climate and exam schedule — all these inputs are being taken into consideration. Only then we will be able to say whether they will be staggered or multi-phase.”
Zaidi spoke at the event on the idea of compulsory voting and said it is not practical. Terming use of money power as a “matter of concern”, he said, “We have a strategy and we are making it more robust.” The poll panel has already written to the Government to make bribery an electoral offence.
On compulsory voting, Zaidi said that the debate is still on but based on practice which is prevailing in some countries, the same has been discussed even by Parliament but not found practical.
In February, while responding to a private member’s bill introduced in the lok Sabha on compulsory voting, the then law Minister DV Sadananda Gowda had said, though he appreciated the intention of the members, it would not be possible for the government to introduce compulsory voting and penalise those who failed to exercise their franchise.
Even the law Commission recommended against compulsory voting terming it as “highly undesirable” To a question on the holding of simultaneous lok Sabha and assembly elections. Zaidi said that the Commission has told a Parliamentary Committee and the law Ministry that such an exercise can be undertaken once political parties are unanimous in amending the Constitution and after meeting demands by the poll panel to buy new EVMs.