Gujarat Going to Be First State Bringing in Online Voting System
Gujarat is going to be the first state in the country to enable its citizens to cast their franchise online with state government and State Election Commission (SEC) deciding to bring in e-voting system in the next civic body polls, said media reports.
“This will be for the first time in the country that in any official election the method of online voting via internet will be used, beginning with Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation polls scheduled in mid-October followed by Rajkot, Vadodara, Surat, Bhavnagar and Jamnagar local body elections,” SEC Secretary, PH Shah was quoted as saying.
“A task force has been formed to cover all the aspects of e-voting headed by State Election Commissioner KC Kapoor,” Shah was quoted as saying.
He also said that state urban development department had issued a draft notification asking for objections and suggestions on the issue last week, reports said.
“The purpose for introduction of online voting is to make affluent class people vote, who generally avoid going to polling booths and standing in long queues to vote. Besides, youths will be attracted to vote in this manner,” he was quoted as saying.
“We are planning to rope in top IT firms of the country to give end-to-end services as it involves finer aspects like secrecy of vote, authenticity of the voter, ensuring that no bogus voting takes place,” Shah was quoted as saying.
(Based on internet reports)
