NEW DELHI, DEC 23: The Centre has constituted a committee to study the Election Commission's (EC) proposal to introduce proxy voting for over 50 lakh personnel of the Armed and paramilitary forces and diplomatic corps, the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) M S Gill said today.``I hope the committee, comprising three Union secretaries, will seriously consider the proposal,'' Gill said, while briefing mediapersons at the end of the two-day meeting with representatives of national and regional political parties.The CEC said that all parties shared the concern of the Commission regarding the impracticability of the postal ballot system for service voters. ``Though there was widespread support from all parties to the Commission's proposal, many suggested that the issue needs to be considered in detail and discussed in Parliament before any final decision is taken,'' he said, adding that the Commission realised the difficulties of implementing a new scheme within a short span of time.In case the Government takes a decision to introduce proxy voting, a Presidential ordinance would have to be promulgated to amend the Representation of People Act (RPA) 1951 and the Indian Penal Code (IPC).Replying to questions as to whether the ceiling on election expenditure should be uniform, as size of constituencies varied enormously, Gill said that the aberrations remained because new delimitations by the Govt had been suspended till the year 2000. He added that all political parties agreed on the need to revise the present ceiling of expenditure at Rs 4.5 lakh for a large Parliamentary constituency and Rs 1.5 lakh for an Assembly seat.Political parties welcomed the Commission's proposal for allotment of time on state-owned electronic media for electioneering, Gill said. The matter was being discussed with Prasar Bharti, he said.The broadcast scheme on DD and AIR includes allocation of total of 10 hours to national parties and 30 hours on regional channels to state recognised parties. The minimum time given to each party will be 30 minutes.Gill said that there was no consensus among parties as to whether counting of votes should be taken up booth-wise or after mixing at a central place.Both national and regional parties brought to the notice of the Commission certain practical difficulties faced by them during the counting period, he added.
