Laws, delimitation and the Election Commission

Think of a cricket match. It needs rules, a fair pitch and an umpire nobody can buy. An election needs the same three things. In India, the rules are the laws, the fair pitch is delimitation, and the umpire is the Election Commission of India (ECI). This lesson takes them one at a time.

The laws. Two Acts of Parliament govern our elections.

• The Representation of the People Act, 1950 (RPA 1950) gets things ready: how many seats each place gets, the boundaries of constituencies, preparing and revising the electoral roll (the voters' list, matdata suchi), and making sure every citizen aged 18 and above can vote without discrimination.
• The RPA 1951 runs everything else: nominating candidates, campaigns, how voting is done, and settling disputes after the election.

There is also a separate law for electing the President and Vice President: the Presidential and Vice-Presidential Elections Act, 1952.

A simple way to remember: 1950 comes first, so it sets things up (seats, boundaries, the voters' list). 1951 comes next, so it runs the contest (candidates, campaign, voting, disputes). Watch out: the electoral roll belongs to the 1950 Act, not the 1951 Act.

The RPA 1951 also lists corrupt practices: things a candidate must never do. Picture each one:

• A candidate offers someone a gift, or promises them something, to make them stand, pull out, vote, or stay away from voting.
• A speaker tells a crowd, "Vote for him, he is from our religion" or "our caste". Asking for votes on the basis of religion, caste, race, community or language is not allowed.
• A candidate gets help from people in government jobs: gazetted officers, judges and magistrates, the armed forces, the police or excise officers. These people must serve everyone equally, so they cannot work for one candidate.

Delimitation (parisiman). Did you know the boundaries of your constituency are not fixed for ever? People move, towns grow, and the number of people in an area changes. Imagine two constituencies that each elect one MP. One now has 25 lakh people and the other has 5 lakh. Both still get one MP. That means a vote in the smaller one counts five times as much. That is not equal.

So delimitation is the work of fixing the number of seats and drawing the boundaries of constituencies for the Lok Sabha and the Vidhan Sabha. The aim is that each seat stands for roughly the same number of people. Article 82 of the Constitution provides for a Delimitation Commission. India has had four: in 1952, 1963, 1973 and 2002. The book asks you to find out, with your teacher, why there was such a long gap between 1973 and 2002.

The umpire: the ECI (Bharat Nirvachan Aayog). The Constitution gives the ECI charge of the whole election process: it supervises, directs and controls it. The book calls it three things:

• Autonomous: it takes its own decisions.
• Permanent: it is always there, not set up just for one election.
• Constitutional: the Constitution itself creates it, in Articles 324 to 329.

It was set up on 25 January 1950.

The ECI conducts elections to the Lok Sabha, the Rajya Sabha, the Vidhan Sabha, the Vidhan Parishad, and the offices of the President and the Vice President. Notice what is not on this list: panchayat and municipal elections.

"How can one commission in Delhi run an election in every village?" It has helpers everywhere. In each state, a Chief Electoral Officer supervises election work. The ECI picks this officer from among the civil servants, after talking to the state government. Then officers already working in the districts, such as District Magistrates, Sub-Divisional Magistrates and Tahsildars, are given election duties as District Election Officers, Returning Officers, Electoral Registration Officers and so on.

Now, what does the ECI actually do? Job 1: it makes the voters' list. Officials called enumerators go to every household to collect details of the people who can vote. From this, an electoral roll is made for each constituency, polling station by polling station. Only people whose names are on the roll can vote.

To keep the list correct, the ECI runs a Special Intensive Revision (SIR): it updates, checks and corrects the roll. Two goals: no eligible citizen is left out, and no ineligible person is included.

• It adds new voters, especially young people who have just turned 18 and might be missed.
• It removes names for four reasons: the voter has died, has moved house, is listed twice, or cannot be traced at all.

Before the final list is published, people can raise claims or objections, and the ECI settles them. You will turn 18 in a few years; this is how your name gets on the list.

Job 2: it fixes the election dates. An election is due when the five-year term ends, or earlier if the legislature is dissolved. In a country as big as India, the ECI has to think about:

• Weather: heavy rain or snow can stop people reaching the booth.
• The farming cycle: at sowing or harvest, farmers are busy in their fields.
• School and university exams: pupils and teachers are busy.
• Festivals: families are celebrating or travelling.

Job 3: it registers parties and gives them symbols. Only parties registered with the ECI can put up candidates. Independent candidates, who belong to no party, can stand too. The ECI makes parties hold their own internal elections regularly, so that parties are democratic inside as well. It sorts parties into national, state and registered-unrecognised parties, and gives national and state parties their symbols. If there is a dispute about a party's recognition or symbol, the ECI decides it, acting like a court (quasi-judicial: like a court, though it is not one).

Job 4: it keeps elections free, fair and open to everyone ("No Voter to Be Left Behind").

• Voting from home for senior citizens above 85 and for persons with a benchmark disability of 40%, across India for the first time in the 2024 General Elections.
• EVMs with Braille, so that voters who cannot see can vote.
• ETPBS (Electronically Transmitted Postal Ballot System): service voters posted away from home get their postal ballot electronically and vote from wherever they are.

The ECI also uses apps. Each one fixes a real problem:

Two more things. 25 January is National Voters' Day, the same date the ECI was set up in 1950; on it, citizens take a pledge to vote in every election, fearlessly, and without being swayed by religion, race, caste, community, language or any inducement. And the ECI works with other countries too: through its International Election Visitors' Programme (IEVP) it has agreements (MoUs) with 28 election bodies abroad and three international organisations, including the United Nations.