Law and Justice Minister Kiren Rijiju on Thursday told the Rajya Sabha that the Centre was not planning on amending the Representation of the People Act, 1951 to enable a common electoral roll and simultaneous elections to all electoral bodies in the country.
Asked by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Kirodi Lal Meena if such an amendment was in the works, Mr. Rijiju’s written reply stated: “No sir”. However, the Minister said a meeting chaired by the Cabinet Secretary with Chief Secretaries of various States was held on September 3, 2020, “related to the use of common electoral rolls in the elections to local bodies”.
The reply stated that “certain concerns were raised” at the meeting but there was consensus that “state governments are required to make changes in their legislations to adopt the electoral rolls for Parliamentary and Assembly elections for use in local body elections”. In that case, the Election Commission of India (EC) would add more fields in the existing electoral rolls to enable ward-wise segregation of voters, the reply said. The EC would also be “required to provide adequate” Electronic Voting Machines to the States for local body elections, it said. The Minister said political parties were not a part of the meeting, so the “question of their consensus does not arise”.
Asked what the main objective of the proposal was, the Minister said: “The Common Electoral Roll would reduce the cost and effort involved in the process of preparing separate electoral rolls.”
While the Centre may not be planning to amend the Representation of the People Act, it has held meetings with various stakeholders, including the EC, on the possibility of States adopting the same electoral roll for local body polls. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has spoken in favour of “one nation, one election” many times.
