Tripura CM seeks opinion to hold state, assembly elections together

AGARTALA: Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar on Sunday urged all concerned to think over the proposal of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to hold state assembly elections and general elections together to reduce poll related expenditure and  administrative exercise.
Releasing the book penned down by Former Joint Chief Electoral Officer (JCEO) of Tripura Hrinmoy Chakraborty here, Sarkar said that several proposals of electoral reforms have been proposed in India in recent years to ensure free, fair and effective elections.
The efforts are being made as part of a reform by Election Commission of India (ECI) but civil society members and intellectuals have still been demanding more reform for a vibrant democracy in India.
The matter of holding elections together and state-funded election was a long-debated issues of reform, which have gained ground recently.
The representatives of the Trinamool Congress, Congress and civil society members expressed that there was a need for massive reform in ECI and they also demanded a separate all India cadre like other services in ECI to hold free and fair elections.
“ECI doesn’t have any manpower and always hired them from respective state governments for holding elections in that state. As a result, misuse of administration by the party in power for holding elections in its favour is quite common in the states,” proposed Trinamool Congress leader Sushanta Choudhury.
Varma had made three specific recommendations- state level employees of election department should be under control of ECI and transferred across the country, there should be at least one voter registration personnel in each Panchayat who is responsible for updating the list of voters under direct supervision of ECI and there should be a standard model of election campaign for all the parties at the finance of ECI.
As a result, neutrality of officials involved in the process was always present and there was a possibility of bias towards the ruling government, which virtually frustrates the ultimate aim of election. (UNI)