ECI lauds Haryana, Kerala for updating photo poll cards

Kurukshetra, Jan 16 (UNI) Election Commissioner of India, Dr S Y Quraishi today appreciated the efforts of the Haryana and Kerala Governments as well as Kerala Government for updating the photo electoral rolls well in time.

He was talking to the mediapersons here after inaugurating a national conference in Kurukshetra University on the subject "1857: Revisited".

Dr Quraishi said that the ECI would hold the Lok Sabha polls on the basis of the new delimitation commission report if these are held as per schedules in 2009.

Answering a query, he said that he had no idea of changes made in the constituencies in Haryana but added that the changes in the areas of the constituencies had made an impact everywhere in the country.

He said the delimitation work was being conducted by another commission although the ECI has its one member on this panel.

Though the EC was critical of those who did not vote in the elections, he did not favour the view that voting should be made mandatory saying that such things could not be forced in a democracy.

A Haryana cadre IAS officer, who resigned from IAS to join as the ECI, Dr Quraishi said that the ECI was in the electronic mode of preparing electoral photo-rolls so that no bogus polling could take place anywhere in the country in the parliamentary as well as the assembly polls.

"If this mode is achieved, elections in the country would be free and fair without any act of violence", he expressed hope.

In another answer, he said that it was not possible for the ECI to provide electronic voting machines in the panchayat elections as it does not have the multi-choice functioning as required for the panchayat polls.

But if some states requested, the ECI could consider making available such multiple choice EVMs on the new models, he added.

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