CEO highlights amendments to Representation of the People Act (RPA)
Multiple qualifying dates adopted for fresh registration
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, August 30 2022: Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Rajesh Agrawal has high-lighted the recent amend- ments made to the Representation of the People Act (RPA) .

The amendments were made by the Ministry of Law and Justice in accordance with the recommen- dations forwarded by the Election Commission of India (ECI) .

The CEO held a meeting with representatives of 10 recognised National/State political parties at his Lamphelpat office today.

The meeting was attended by All India Trinamool Congress (AITC), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Communist Party of India (CPI), Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Janata Dal-United (JD-U), Indian National Congress (INC), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), National Peoples Party (NPP), Naga Peoples Front (NPF) and Peoples Democratic Alliance (PDA) .

CEO highlights amendments to Representation of the People Act (RPA)

Rajesh Agrawal said that, as per the recommendation of the ECI, the Ministry of Law & Justice has amended the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Representation of the People Act, 1951 .

The amendment covers the aspects of multiple qualifying dates for registration in the electoral roll, furnishing of Aadhaar number by the existing electors and citizens seeking registration in the electoral roll, gender neutral provisions for service electors and special electors and power to acquire premises for the con- duct of elections, he added.

The CEO apprised the representatives of political parties that there will be four qualifying dates i.e, 1st January, 1st April, 1st July and 1st October as eligibility for youngsters to register in electoral rolls as opposed to the earlier single qualifying date of 1st January only.

Now, 17+ year old youngsters can apply in advance for having their names enrolled in voter's list and they do not have to await the prerequisite criterion of attaining age of 18 years on 1st January of a year.

With multiple qualifying dates, the timelag for registration in the electoral roll after being eligible, has been reduced thereby enabling a large number of eligible electors to get themselves registered in the electoral roll, he added.

He said that the electoral rolls would be updated every quarter henceforth.

While highlighting the amendments made in various Forms, Rajesh Agrawal informed that Form 6 shall be used only for fresh registration, Form 7 for objection to proposed inclusion or deletion of a person from the electoral roll or self deletion.

Form 8 shall be used for correction of particulars, shifting of residence, marking of PwD and replacement of EPIC.

He also informed that Form 8A which was earlier used for transposition of electors has been discontinued.

The CEO stated that the ECI has launched a nationwide programme on 1st August, 2022 for collection of Aadhaar from the electors with the objective of establishing the identity of elec- tors and authentication of entries in electoral roll which will eventually help in identifying registration of name of the same person in more than one constituency or more than once in the same constituency.

He informed that collection of Aadhaar numbers in Form 6B may be done online by the electors themselves or through offline.

An elector may fill Form 6B online through www.nvsp.in or www.voterportal.eci.gov.in or Voter Helpline App.

In offline mode, the BLOs are currently making house-to-house visit for collection of Aadhaar number from electors in hard copy using Form 6B.All the off-line submitted Form 6B shall be digitised by BLOs using GARUDA App or by ERO using ERONET within seven days of the receipt of the Forms.

In case, the elector does not have the Aadhaar number and thereby is not able to furnish Aadhaar Number, he/she needs to submit a copy of any of the eleven alternative documents viz; MGNREGA job card, passbook with photograph issued by bank/post office, health insurance smart card issued under the scheme of Ministry of Labour, driving license, PAN card, smart card issued by RGI under NPR, Indian Passport, pension document with photo- graph, service identity card with photograph issued to employees by Central/State/Govt/PSUs/public limited companies, official identity cards issued to MPS/MLAs/MLCs, and Unique Identity ID(UDID) card issued by Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.

Response of the electors to the initiative of furnishing Aadhaar data is very encouraging and satisfactory in the State, particularly in the valley districts, he remarked.

Till date, Bishnupur district tops the list with 86.71 per cent of electors furnishing their Aadhaar data.

The list is followed by Jiribam (83.39 pc), Thoubal (64.59 pc) Kangpokpi (58.92 pc), Imphal East (53.12 pc), Imphal West (50.17 pc), Churachandpur (40.93 pc), Tamenglong (39.44 pc), Ukhrul (32.24 pc), Senapati (19.28 pc) and Chandel (17.80 pc) .

Rajesh Agrawal sought cooperation of the political parties in terms of dissemination of information and to convince the electors in furnishing their Aadhaar data.

He also stated that the privacy of data of the electors shall be maintained.

With respect to gender neutral provision for service and special electors, Rajesh Agrawal said that the word "wife" has been substituted by the word "spouse" in relevant sections of Representation of People Act, 1950 and Representation of People Act, 1951 .

Accordingly, the husband of a female service personnel can now register as service elector along with his wife.

Earlier, only the wife of a male service personnel was allowed to register as service elector along with her husband.

While stating that the ambit of requisitioning power of election authorities has been enlarged, he informed that Section 160 of Representation of People Act, 1951 has been amended to the extent that the election authorities are empowered to requisition any premises likely to be needed for the purpose of being used as polling station, for counting, for storage of ballot boxes, voting machines (including voter verifiable paper audit trail) and poll related materials after a poll has been conducted, accommodation for security forces and polling personnel after the issuance of the election notification by the Election Commission under Section 30 of RPA, 1951 .

The CEO highlighted that the special summary of photo electoral rolls with respect to January 1, 2023 shall begin with publication of integrated draft photo electoral rolls on November 9, 2022.The period for filing claims and objections is from November 9 to December 8 and the final electoral rolls will be published on January 5, 2023 .

Currently, as a pre-revision activity, the exercise for rationalization of polling stations is being undertaken by the District Election Officers.

The CEO emphasized upon amalgamation of polling stations rather than creation of new polling stations to save cost at the time of elections.

He also requested the political parties to give inputs to the concerned DEOs so that appropriate polling stations are set up to enable voters to experience voting in much better manner.

He also sought cooperation of the political parties in deletion of death and shifted electors which are currently undertaken by the Electoral Registration Officers as a pre-revision activity.