Moopanar calls for curbing poll malpractices

CHENNAI, FEB 7: Tamil Maanila Congress president G K Moopanar has called for electoral reforms that will enable a majority of the elector...

CHENNAI, FEB 7: Tamil Maanila Congress president G K Moopanar has called for electoral reforms that will enable a majority of the electorate – 70 to 80 per cent- to participate in the electoral process so that malpractices during elections would be severely curtailed.

Participating in a seminar organised by the Science and Technology Cell of the TMC in Chennai today, he said besides preventing irregularities indulged in by parties and their candidates, the majority participation will also lead to a clear electoral verdict that will help political parties form stable governments.

Referring to the fractured verdicts delivered in 1996 as well as 1998 elections, he pointed out that the verdicts resulted in unstable governments, including the present BJP-led Central Government, whose longevity is a question that has to be discussed day in and day out.

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Unless the concept of “voting is a must” gets registered in the minds of the people, particularly the educated middle and lower classes, the objective ofholding elections and building institutions by democratic means will be defeated, he cautioned.

Political parties have the duty to mobilise all sections and educate them on political reforms, but they suffer from serious limitations, he said, adding non-political organisations and societal leaders should come forward to transform political institutions.

Moopanar, in this context, exhorted the media to play its due role in espousing the cause of reforms, inform the public and bring about a basic change in the political process that will redraw the equations among the political parties and reconstruct the democratic institutions in the country.Earlier, Makkal Sakthi’ leader M S Udayamurthy and chairperson of the Science & Technology Cell of the TMC, V Narayanan, presented a set of reforms for debate and discussion at all levels of the electorate.

Among the demands were that the ruling party should step down at the time of elections to ensure free and fair elections, and that the funding of the partiesby business houses should be accounted for.

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The candidates should be cleared by the Election Commission after verifying their antecedents; those who have been charge-sheeted should not contest; and poll-related cases should be disposed of quickly — these were some of the reforms needed. Other reforms required are that every voter should be identified at the polling booth and that caste-based mobilisation of voters followed by inducements and threats should be dealt with seriously by security forces. If a voter parts with Re 1 every month in an Assembly constituency towards election funding, in five years it will add up to more than Rs 1 crore, Narayanan pointed out.