Team Anna and Election Commission of India on Monday agreed to appeal to the central government to include the option of 'none of the above'.
In what could be a major breakthrough, Team Anna and Election Commission of India (EC) Monday agreed to appeal to the central government to include the option of 'none of the above' in electronic voting machines during upcoming assembly elections in five states, a proposal which pending since 2003.
"We had a fruitful discussion with EC on electoral reforms. While we agreed that right to recall requires more discussion to arrive on a particular model, they were positive on right to reject.
They would soon write to the union law ministry to allow inclusion of none of the above button in EVMs before the assembly elections in five states next year takes place," team Anna member Arvind Kejriwal told DNA.
Interestingly, the proposal is not new. "EC officials told us that they had written to law ministry in 2003 for this but even after several reminders government is mum on this. As per EC, the law ministry doesn't even need to go to parliament as it can be done through a simple executive order within a day," Kejriwal said. "EC would now again write to law ministry asking them to pass such an order. We also make an appeal to law ministry to agree with this," he added.
Now, if a voter doesn't want to vote for any candidate, he just needs to ask for form 49-O at a polling booth. But this identifies a voter whereas in new proposed system if such button comes in EVMs then voters would be able to register that they are not voting for anyone in the list of candidates.
"Even if the none of the above option gets the most votes, it won't mean that election of candidate getting highest number of votes would get cancelled. It would be just a form of registering protest," Kejriwal explained.
The option of right to reject a candidate was also discussed. But for that an amendment in the Representation of People's Act would be required.
At the meeting, the EC was represented by CEC SY Qureshi and election commissioners HS Brahma and VS Sampath, team Anna comprised of Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi, Prashant Bhushan, Shanti Bhushan and Manish Sisodia.
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