World's largest democracy might break its own record.
As a country of 1.3 billion people, more than 800 million of whom are eligible to vote, India takes pride in being the “world's largest democracy.”
And now Indian government plans to increase the number of voters by giving proxy voting rights to over 25 million Non-Residential Indians (NRIs), Hindustan Times reports.
A bill which will allow NRIs to vote will be introduced in the upcoming winter session of Indian Parliament.
Attorney General of India, KK Venugopal told the Supreme Court on Friday, “An amendment (has to) be made in the relevant central law (the Representation of People Act), and the government intends to introduce a bill in the winter session of Parliament for the purpose.”
On July 21, Attorney General K K Venugopal had told the court that NRIs could not be allowed to vote by merely changing the rules made under the Representation of People (RP) Act and a Bill was needed to be introduced in Parliament to amend the Act itself to grant the voting rights.
The court had on July 14 asked the Centre to decide whether it would amend the electoral law or rules to allow NRIs to vote by postal or e-ballots in the polls in the country, taking note of the fact that the Centre and the Election Commission of India (ECI) were agreeable to the report of a panel that NRIs might be allowed to vote.
The Supreme Court of India is hearing a batch of petitions filed by Nagender Chindam, the chairman of London-based Pravasi Bharat organisation and other NRIs including Shamsheer V P and has given the government 12 weeks to carry out the exercise.
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