EVMs with Braille facility this time

In a first in a civic election, visually challenged voters can now cast their votes without assistance after the State Election Commission has decided to introduce Braille-facilitated electronic voting machines (EVMs), starting with Mumbai.

Earlier, the rule was that one person would accompany a visually challenged voter to help him/her to cast a vote. Mumbai is estimated to have anywhere between 40,000 and 60,000 visually challenged residents.

This new facility provided by the Election Commission has not come easily. The EC was petitioned by activists and NGOs working in the disability sector to create necessary infrastructure for the disabled to participate in the democratic process.

After Disability Rights Group, a Delhi-based NGO, approached the Supreme Court in this regard and got a favorable ruling in 2004, Braille-facilitated EVMs were used in a by-election in Andhra Pradesh that year.

“The idea behind this move was that a blind voter be guaranteed dignity and secrecy of his vote,” said Chand Goyal, additional secretary of the  State Election Commission.

“Before the introduction of these EVMs, which have a strip of paper encoding the options in Braille stuck on it, the blind voter used to be accompanied by an officer who would help him cast his vote,” he added.

The EC has made some more changes in the machines, including registering the voting time, the ward and voter booth number.