India Chooses All-Electronic Voting

MaximusTheGreat writes "While the U.S. debates the merits of e-voting, India has decided to have all electronic polls in the next elections for its billion strong population. Though India has used e-voting partially in previous elections, it will be the first time a Lok Sabha (central parliament) election will be held in the country since 1952 without the use of ballot papers. Election Commission plans to use about 800,000 electronic voting machines. Also, taking note from India's experience, other commonwealth countries like Malaysia and Britain will be sending representatives to India to see the use of EVMs during the Assembly elections. On a related note they plan to make voter's identity card mandatory for voting."

Comments

How they used to do it in the old days

[Heartz]

In the "old days", indians who voted would have their fingers marked with a special dye that would take 2 weeks to disappear. :)

Therefore there was no need for any ID Cards. Sigh, practical technology being replaced with technology that infringes on freedoms.

Voting, numbers and caste system

[ControlFreal]

First off, this election will generate a"vote-databases" larger than about any other election on this planet. Given that about a billion people live in India, there will be hundreds of millions of votes. Although electronic voting is nothing new (in the Netherlands the elections are almost 100% electronic for years now), the sheer scale of this electronic election makes it interesting.

But exactly how many people eligible for voting are there? Obviously, a significant number of the about 1 billion inhabitants will be under the legal voting age.

And then, how about the caste system? Please note that I'm not trying to be a troll here: I know the caste system doesn't officially exist anymore, but I've been in India for work for a month, and I found it pretty clear that people from different castes are treated differently. Are people from the lowests castes (or the caste-less) discouraged from voting in any way? And does the mandatory presentation of an ID-card prevent many of these people from voting?

Is there anyone who can provide a decent, and honest, background on this? It is an interesting sociological issue.

Mandatory Voting cards

[fven]

They propose to make having voting cards mandatory even if all voters do not get the cards. This could be a cause for concern if there are hassles getting the cards. I would like to know the reason only 65% of voters have a card. Is there any way to get a card on the day or is there a cutoff?

Voting is voluntary in India (source: Subas Pani, Deputy Election Commissioner, Election Commission of India, subaspani(a)eci.gov.in) so I guess it doesn't matter much.

They have only 1500 voters at each polling station so vote rigging is kind of limited in effect (there are always ways and means I realise).

I'm interested to see how this goes for them.

No.

[The Cydonian]

As someone who is studying technology deployment in India, I disagree.

Back in India, we face the same problems as any other democracy; heck, I'll argue that we face more lobbyists and well-entrenched groups than you Americans do. The ongoing 'debate' over the tax reform is a perfect example; the central government has been trying to move all the 25 states into a uniform VAT zone for the last 8 or so years without any succcess. Grapevine has it that a solution is possible only in 2005, well after the next round of general elections. We are, after all, one-sixth of all humanity; there's bound to be someone somewhere who doesn't like something for some reason.

The electronic voting machines also had significant problems in deployment; if I remember correctly, they were developed way back in the 80's itself, at the (government-owned) Electronic Corporation of India Ltd (the products webpage doesn't mention voting machines, so I could be wrong on the company) There were just too many groups resisting technology; as followers of Indian politics will note, elections in the 80's and 90's were invariably accompanied by booth-capturing, rigging and voter impersonation. Goondas (that's Indian English for the American 'rowdy') patronised by political parties would often take over polling booths, and stuff ballot papers in them. If you really wanted to vote on Election Day, you'd want to vote early in the day itself; not only to avoid the crowd, and violence if any, but also because someone else would have already voted under your name. And then, there'd be those political clashes, electoral violence, bomb blasts... an endless tyranny making a mockery of our constitutional values.

Obviously, the situation needed some strong action and, as I recall, the then Election Commissioner, Mr TN Seshan (who was and still is a sort of middle-class Indian hero), strongly asserted his Commission's independence from the government de jour, by the following measures:-

a)Paramilitary Forces:-
Not many Indians realise this, but elections in India see the world's largest peacetime movement of troops. All elections these days, unless they are the sub-province-level Panchayat elections, are actually conducted by the federal paramilitary battalions, the Border Security Force (BSF), the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) etc, and not the state police, who report to the government of the day and, therefore, presumably are not to be trusted.[1]

b) Behavioural Changes:-
For a month or so before the actual elections exercise, the Commission enforces a so-called "Model Code of Conduct" on all political parties; among other things, the contestants can't promise soft bribes for their constituents. Compliance is entirely voluntary; the Commission can't, for instance, pull someone up for breaking the Code, but then, which contestant in his right mind would want to be caught on the wrong side of his constituents' ire?

This was certainly the case between 1991 and 1995/6, until elections were announced in the teeny-weeny state of Goa, bringing us to step (c), technology.

c) Technology:-
Only after the above two easy-sounding, but difficult-to-implement steps did the Election Commission turn to technology. Even there there has been significant backlash; as I recall, there were many states that were tardy in issuing voter ID's. And even in that, the voter ID's are technologically-minimal; they are basically laminated printouts of a voter's digital pic, his name, address, date of birth, and the EC's hologram.

The end result is a vastly improved electoral process. Booth capturing and rigging will now completely vanish, even if it's only because the goondas haven't as yet figured out how to crack the voting machine. And then, there are obvious questions as to the quality of the nincompoops we elect.

That, however, shouldn't d