Aadhaar and Voter ID to be linked; Cabinet clears draft Bill

The linkage of voter ID with Aadhaar so as to weed out bogus and duplicate entries in the electoral roll

December 16, 2021

Union Cabinet clears draft Bill for linking Aadhaar and Voter ID

The Union Cabinet on Wednesday cleared proposed amendments that the Election Commission had proposed including Link Aadhaar With Voter IDwhich will curb multiple enrollments of the same individual at different places.

Another proposal in the reforms will allow the Election Commission to take over any premise for the conduct of elections overruling objections to taking over schools as polling booths.

The linkage of Voter ID with Aadhaar so as to weed out bogus and duplicate entries in the electoral roll. Sources indicated that another reform sought to be implemented is allowing multiple dates in a year, rather than only January 1, for those above 18 years, to register themselves as voters,

According to the bill cleared by the Cabinet, the electoral law will be made “gender-neutral” for service voters. Another provision of the bill will allow new voters to enroll on four different dates every year. As of now, those turning 18 on or before January 1 of every year are only allowed to register as voters.

According to reports, the Law Ministry started working on the proposal in 2020 when Ravi Shankar Prasad was the minister. In August this year, Law Minister Kiren Rijiju informed Parliament that the government was considering the EC’s proposal. “After consulting various stakeholders, the Commission submitted its 244th and 255th Reports encompassing various aspects of electoral reforms which, inter alia, include disqualification from contesting election on framing of charges, regulation of election finance and opinion polls, ban on paid news, etc,” he said in a written reply.

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