Skyward Fire

In my previous post, I discussed why the procedure for elections in India needs a major overhaul. Now, I’m going to share my views on how that can be done. A few days ago, in a conversation with @abhishekkant, we were shedding light on the same exact agenda. We came to a conclusion that there has to separate ways of looking at the voter crowd – urban & rural. Implementation of technology and live information sharing on a larger scale is a necessity of the recent times amongst the urban voter crowd. Obviously, the techniques we’ll want to work out for the urban and sub-urban voter crowd would be completely different. But just working out a proper layout for the procedure specifically for the urban crowd would boost the outcome percentage from disgusting figures like 18%, 40% and 53% to something marginally larger.

The process for registration of voters and then consequently, voting, has to be made easier. Not just the reason being for the same as it would make things easier for everyone, but also the fact that it can be done and it’ll work in everyone’s favor in more ways than we can think off. That is exactly why you have more people voting in to stupid reality shows than in the Government’s elections. You don’t have to stand in the sun, you don’t have to bother about getting shot, you don’t have to do all the senseless thinking about where you’re supposed to go vote, or you don’t have to physically travel somewhere to find out whether you have your name on the voter’s list, and registering as a fresh voter would be a breeze too. The thing about using online services in India, even in the 21st century, is that, be it banking or paying your taxes, or booking train tickets, or something related to Government operations, is that no matter how much you think your work will be done online with ease – at some point of time, you’ll have to involve yourself physically and directly. The reason for the same is cited as security issues. There is the fact that to get things done without a security hitch, you’ll have to get involved personally. Is there a way out of it? Of course. If you’re using the optimum methodology, and gold-standard tools, it’s not so difficult after all.

The following steps can be taken to make the process of voting easier and convenient for those in cities and towns.

• Digital profiling of everyone over the age of 18 providing them with some kind of an identification. PAN cards can be expanded, and made more detailed. There’s no need of any other format. The PAN card, like any ordinary debit card, can contain all required information of the particular person, and it can be used at multiple channels as a source of identification including but not limited to just the elections. When it comes to costs for making sophisticated PAN cards on a massive scale, I’m sure many of our undeserving politicos can live without carcades with a dozen vehicles and personal security that they get from the tax payers’ money. It’s high time our taxes were put to better use.
• The PAN card part deserves another mention in the process of it’s initial registration process. In various cases, PAN cards can be made by forged support documents and voter count can be faked. The one and only way of tackling that is shelling out corruption, and making the whole process of registration more automatic, thus lowering the possibility of human interference where it’s not needed.
• Conducting the elections on the same day everywhere.
• Using specially designed computers instead of electronic voting machines that are connected to a single national server which will store the votes once casted instantly no matter where it is being done, and then keeping count and providing live feed of the preliminary results consistently, keeping the whole thing as transparent as possible. Such computers can also provide real time video help to those who need it, and with a camera on the computer, the voters can be kept under scrutiny and also, a voter support channel will remain open to help anyone who needs it.
• Those based abroad with dual citizenships can be asked to register themselves at the embassies in the countries they are currently residing at a month before elections, so that they will be allotted a username and a password, that they can use on an NRI voting portal on their own computers at home or at work and cast their votes without having to come back to their constituencies in India. The same can work for those who’re in India and aren’t sure they will be able to go to the kiosk to vote on the day of the election.
• The election commission should maintain a proper and very detailed & transparent database of everyone who’s contesting the elections, and make it a high priority deal to ensure that it’s publically available to everyone who needs to know about their would-be leaders. Even though the same is done to some extent right now by NGOs, it is not enough. For example, everyone knows the reality behind the facts and figures on the personal financial profile that these contestants give out to the election commission. Rigorous reviews of the same needs to be done with a constant vigilance.

I’m sure that the aforementioned points, if thought upon by the authorities and the details worked out well enough, would smoothen up the process and motivate more and more people to vote and give them a chance to sincerely involve themselves in the enrichment of the country’s democracy.

The Lok Sabha elections have been going on in India right now, and today was the third phase of the elections. I voted for the first time earlier today. As far as news reports suggest, the turn-out has been a measly 12% until 12 noon. Despite all the voter motivation and public service announcement gigs, the turn-out has been disturbingly depressing. In India, voting in elections is considered to be a duty, not a compulsion, which I believe, needs to change. And the whole machinery of the procedure needs to be oiled and improvised accordingly. You can’t really blame the people in general. Considering what I saw with my own eyes, people did indeed turn up in massive numbers at various booths. But it was disgraceful to see them return when their names were missing from the voter list, despite them being eligible and possessing all the documents required for the voting process.

The administration has promised of adequate information kiosks and help-lines in abundance to help those out in need, but the ground reality was something completely different. Even at the booths themselves, including the one where I voted, the officials didn’t seem to know much beyond the bare minimum you’d expect them to know in reference to conducting the elections. The Election Commission appoints observers, and special observers, preferably IAS officers, who answer to no one but the EC itself. You expect them to show courtesy and sincerity towards what they are supposed to do, but the scene here was completely adverse.

Change must come to India, particularly to how the system works. Flow of information needs to be more transparent, and in much higher bandwidth. What could possibly be the reason that people don’t have their names on the voter list? What could have caused confusion regarding the fact that, even if their names are on the voter list, which booth out of 12-13 booths in the vicinity they’re supposed to approach. There is no database, there is no voter help-line, and when you take an initiative to reach the ‘higher order’ for an enquiry, they laugh at you and turn you back.

I don’t have a voter ID card. I ran around multiple places to get the same made, but no avail. The officer who is supposed to register new people and make voter IDs dealt with me really rudely, but I still didn’t loose patience until I had scored my voter ID. In the end, this clerk at the registrar’s office approached me with and offered me a deal. He asked me to pay Rs. 2000 and said my voter ID card would be handed to me in a couple of hours after I paid. There was no point in taking that conversation further. Anyway, I decided to use my PAN card instead and somehow managed to secure my vote. I asked some of my friends whether they voted, and to a sad surprise, I was the only one. They had their reasons. Some didn’t think there was a point choosing between Lucifer & another fallen angel. Some thought there is just no point venturing out in this heat. Some went to the booth and came back with a clean finger saying their name was not on the list at the booth they went to, and they believed it wasn’t worth running around and finding out why. I couldn’t go on with any of these conversations either.

For me, I personally feel voting for the first time feels like an achievement. By the end of the day, it would be good to know that I am amongst the 12%-15% who are desperate to decide the fate of the country and try their level best to put the country into relatively better hands. The day at the opera for me has officially come to an end.