THE RIGHT TO USE VOTE

The right to vote is given by constitution to every citizen, but how many of them use this
right to cast and choose a legitimate government is the matter of concern. The more concern
topic can also be how many eligible voters ready and willing to vote are able to give the vote.
The right to vote is considered to be the legal right of the citizens of India. This Right as
delegated is used by the selected few with cautious and diligence. A major chunk of the
Indian population living outside the country uses the proxy voting system. This proxy voting
system is by far used by the personnel of Indian Armed Services. The larger group of
population migrating within the country has always been ignored in the broadest terms. This
population includes the people who migrate from their state and hometowns to other places
for education and jobs. The majority of this group comes from the age group of 18 and above
years who are eligible for the vote. The problem of the less participation of the people in the
elections of the country can be very easily solved if these eligible voters can have a way out
for the voting.

The campaign started by the Times on Lost Voters clearly supports the issue of how the votes
of the people who are eligible and willing to vote are deprived of the votes. The proxy voting
recently allowed for the NRIs is being encouraged greatly by the people in and out of the
country. But the group of people who are migrating in search of jobs and education are not
able to cast their votes. Many of them cannot afford to return to their registered place to cast
vote and return while it could have been feasible for the NRIs to come and return to other
countries. Apart from the economic problems the youth of the country has been enthusiast for
their duties and rights towards the nation are also been deprived just because they have to
complete their education from a distant place apart from their hometown. A data collected
by the Times for their campaign shows that the army personnel voting through proxy or ballot
system includes only 1.2 million of the total population of the country whereas the migrating
youth and other people inside the country accounts for 280 million. This number is much
greater than the total registered voters in the USA (183 million voters were registered for the
American Presidential Election in 2016).

The 2014 Lok Sabha Election saw the wining of the BJP with a total of 172 million of the
total votes and Congress secured around 107 votes. These numbers show how the total
winning of the party are lesser than the votes not given by the people. Not every voter who is
eligible is lazy and do not cast vote, the essential criteria of being the original resident puts
obstacle in the casting of the votes by internal migrants or the domestic migrants.

For the better representation in the world’s largest democracy there is an urgent need to
address the problem of the various migrant workers, students, employees etc. Though one
cannot get an easy answer to this problem the process will take a too longer and more
expensive way of the representation in democracy. The concept of e-voting is gaining high
popularity in the present time. But the presence of software free from any kind of software
backdrops like hacking cannot be ignored. In addition to this, the identity of the voters is of
great importance and in this process of providing the voting right of the internal migrants
may lead to multiple voting due to multiple fake identities.

Mayuri Vyas

I year

B.A. LL.B.

Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law

Patiala, Punjab