The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a bill on electoral reforms that includes linking of voters’ list with Aadhaar on a voluntary basis to eliminate multiple nominations. The bill is likely to be introduced in the current winter session.
According to the bill, the electoral law for service voters will also be made ‘gender neutral’. As per the provisions of the Electoral Act, the wife of an army soldier is entitled to be enrolled as a service voter, but the husband of a woman army officer is not. But this may change once the bill is approved by the Parliament.
The poll panel had asked the Law Ministry to replace the word ‘wife’ with ‘spouse’ in the provision of the Representation of the People Act relating to service voters.
Four days to enroll
Another provision of the proposed bill would allow youth to enroll as voters on four different dates every year. As of now, only those who turn 18 on or before January 1 every year are allowed to register as a voter.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) was pushing for multiple cut-off dates to allow more eligible people to register as voters. At present, only a person is eligible to be enrolled in the electoral roll who has attained the age of 18 years on or before January 1 of that year. The Election Commission had told the government that the cut-off date of January 1 debars many youths from participating in the election exercise conducted in a particular year.
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