Even as I am debating and arguing with people on me choosing 49-O, I was given this piece to read http://www.indiatogether.org/2009/mar/gov-negvote.htm
For someone who chose to not vote for any candidate, this article talks about other options that we should be given. Why shouldn’t we have the option of ‘None of the above’? At least this way, my vote remains anonymous and I don’t have to have an argument with electoral officers.
Why should I have to vote only from a certain set of candidates? The above article says that the option of not voting for anyone is rarely used because it isn’t a secret. After the scene the electoral officer created at the polling booth when my turn came, I am not surprised people do not use this option even if they know about it. See here to read about that http://bangalore.citizenmatters.in/blogs/show_entry/1039-i-voted
Just because I chose 49-O why should it be equated to disinterest, waste of a vote, ignorance and so on. I did not think any of the candidates in my constituency deserved my vote, so I chose this option.
Against this backdrop, the introduction of a ‘None of the above’ option in the ballot is expected to give the elector a legitimate way of expressing disapproval of candidates in an election without appearing to boycott the proceedings as a whole. As a positive side effect to this, incidences of bogus voting through impersonation of absent voters should come down. There is also perhaps an optimistic view that negative voting will lead eventually to better candidates. The Law Commission in its 170th report on Reform of Electoral Laws, while recommending the negative vote, explained its benefit: “the negative vote is intended to put moral pressure on political parties not to put forward candidates with undesirable record i.e., criminals, corrupt elements and persons with unsavoury background”.
As the article states, the ‘none of the above’ option might just help in better filtering of candidates. Political parties will always know, at the back of their minds, that the people now have some real power.
Critics of the negative vote option do not find anything wrong in principle with the measure. Rather, their criticism is that it may be impractical to implement, that it is unlikely to change voting patterns, and hence unnecessary. Examples are cited of countries with the negative vote where it has not made a great difference. The State of Nevada in the United States has a ‘None of these candidates’ option in its ballots and votes gathered under this option are reported, though the ‘first-past-the-post’ candidate is always declared elected. In the recent presidential elections in the US, only 0.65 per cent of the voters of Nevada voted against all the candidates.
Right now, this is the case. What I did isn’t going to make a difference, as in, one of the jokers is still going to come to power. But I know that I disapproved. I know I didn’t vote for him just for the heck of it. I know I didn’t vote for him saying he was the best among the worst. So on and so forth. I stuck to my guns. The article states that a negative vote is clearly not going to cause any harm.
Why has the NDA and UPA not responded to proposals on introducing negative voting?
Are they scared?
the BJP spokesman and former Law Minister, when contacted about the PIL, remarked that “it is a debatable issue and there should be a thorough debate among the cross-section of people…” (The Tribune, Chandigarh, 25 January, 2005). But the debate had been already on for a mere 7 years or so!
This is the state of affairs.
Some may say that repolling will result in squandering public money all over again. Firstly, public money is already being put to that use. Secondly, how many times will our political parties also withstand repolling? Once, twice?
Again, this may not be a big step in decriminalization of politics. But it can be tried. Like I said before, what harm will it cause? The parties will automatically think twice before choosing a candidate. Distributing saris and packets of liquor may not stop, but people will at least know they have a new option.
When I was talking to an MP candidate recently, he said “Our people are very good. They only want love and affection”. Who in the world is this man kidding? Am I mad to seek love and affection from MPs? Are the people of the country dying for love and affection from these criminals? Who are they fooling?
