Ease norms for NRI voters, BJP tells EC

Raising the issue of NRI voters who are unable to exercise their franchise in Indian elections, BJP today asked the Election Commission to ease norms to enable them to vote in the coming Lok Sabha polls.
Batting for the NRIs, whom the BJP considers a major vote bank, a delegation of party leaders today met Chief Election Commissioner V S Sampath and handed over a memorandum to him asking the EC to take appropriate steps to ease procedures for NRI voting rights in view of the coming general elections.
"It is requested that this Hon'ble Commission considers at the earliest the right to vote by NRIs," Convener of the Overseas Friends of BJP Cell Vijay Jolly said.

He said the EC should use either postal ballot facility, allowing voting to NRIs at an Indian Mission abroad or provide them with online voting rights.
"This will enable them to cast their valuable votes and participate in the political process in India," he said.
The delegation made efforts to woo the large NRI population which is unable to vote in any election. Under the present law, every voter has to be present in person to cast his vote at the constituency he is registered at. Only government officials on election duty have been given the option of postal ballot.

Jolly said NRIs were given voting rights in 2010 through an amendment in the Representation of People Act, 1951, but a majority of NRIs are unable to vote as they have to travel all the way to India to exercise their franchise.

"Due to their professional and family circumstances, it is difficult for a large majority of the NRI community to travel to India specifically for the purpose of exercising their voting right. We don't think it is practical that NRIs would travel back to India just to vote," the BJP leader said.
He said as a result of such difficulties, the right to vote for a majority of NRIs has remained only on paper and cited the example of two million Malayalis living abroad, of whom only 8,820 were registered as voters and only 4,639 could cast their votes in the last assembly elections in Kerala.

Jolly said the present government policy was acting as a deterrent to exercising the right to vote by NRIs.