ID cards for all Assam voters by July: CEC

By Our Staff Reporter

Guwahati, March 24: Chief Election Commissioner Hari Shankar Brahma today emphasized upon the role of the public in stopping the circulation of black money during elections.

 “Use of black money during elections is an unsettled issue. It has been going on for many years. Only consciousness of the public, can resolve the matter. If the people do not take money from the parties, there will be no scope for the mece,” Brahma said while interacting with jourlists here.

Brahma also admitted that there was lack of uniform application of model code of conduct across states and felt that the election watchdog needs to be more aggressive in implementing the rules and acting against violators.

 When it was pointed out that no action is usually taken by the EC except issuing a show cause notice to violators, Brahma said, "I agree that we need to be more aggressive. We would like to bring stronger actions. A notice needs to be followed by logical action."

About linking voter identity card with Aadhar card, Brahma said, “from January, 2015, we have started a tiol voter’s service portal for the assistance of voters to update their data and issuing other necessary documents like passport, driving license etc. With this, every citizen will be able to rectify their data through online service.”

The Chief Election Commissioner also stated that State Assembly elections will be held before May, 2016.

The entire 1.9 crore electorate of Assam will have voters' identity cards by July this year, the CEC said.

At present, only 95 percent of the total electorate have identity cards.

On the sidelines of addressing the workshop of North Eastern Electoral Officers on tiol Electoral Roll Purification & Authentication Program, the CEC said that since January 25 last, the Election Commission of India has started the tiol Voters’ Service Portal, a first of its kind initiative in the world, wherein a voter can find his/her me, address, polling station, etc. online and can rectify the same from any part of the world.

The CEC also said that Electoral Photo Identity Card details have been backed by Aadhar data, creating a link between the two, so that there is no duplication in the electoral roll. Other novel initiatives undertaken by the Commission include changing of one’s place of residence online. All these services can be availed through the Internet without any need for approaching any official in person. The online system also helps in identifying the number of Indian citizens who haven’t registered themselves with the Commission.