Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar on Friday said the time had come for the Election Commission to facilitate postal voting for Non-Resident Indians, while addressing a group of trainee Indian Foreign Service officers. During an interaction with the 2022 batch of IFS trainees at the EC headquarters, Kumar was asked about overseas voting. The EC’s proposal for introducing Electronically Transmitted Postal Ballots is currently pending with the government. “CEC said that time has come when the fifth largest economy of the world invokes technology driven methodology to facilitate its over 1.34 crore overseas Indians to participate in elections by Electronically Transmitted Postal Ballot System. In this potential endeavour, the role of the foreign service and our High Commissions/Embassies world-wide, would be vital,” an EC statement said. The CEC spoke to the trainees about the challenges being faced by election management bodies across the world, particularly “the rising threat from fake news and deep fakes on social media, derailing the election narratives”. He said India’s elections were often regarded as the largest peace-time mobilisation, with over 1 crore polling officials being deployed. “Kumar added that IFS officers should utilise this as an example of the comprehensive national power of India. Linked to India’s impressive economic growth trajectory, the credibility of its electoral domain effectively counters the non-democratic discourse that the electoral process hinders growth,” the EC said. Meanwhile, preparations for next year’s Lok Sabha elections have started as per the EC’s instructions issued on September 13, 2022. As per the EC’s letter to states, the first-level checking of EVMs and VVPATs has to be done 180 days before the polls.
