The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday announced that 17+ year old youngsters can now apply in advance for having their names enrolled in Voter’s list and not necessarily have to await the pre-requisite criterion of attaining age of 18 years on 1st January of a year.
ECI led by Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey directed the CEOs/EROs/AEROs of all States to work out tech-enabled solutions such that the youth are facilitated to file their advance applications with reference to three subsequent qualifying dates i.e. April 1, July 1 and October 1and not just January 1.
Henceforth, the Electoral Roll will be updated every quarter and eligible youngsters can be registered in the next quarter of the year in which he/she has attained the qualifying age of 18 years. After getting registered, he/she will be issued an Electoral Photo Identity Card (EPIC).
For the current round of annual revision of electoral roll, 2023, any citizen attaining the age of 18 years by April 1, July 1 and October 1 of 2023 can also submit an advance application for registration as a voter from the date of draft publication of electoral roll.
The newly modified Forms will come into force on 1st August, 2022. All applications (claims and objections), in old forms, received before 1st August, 2022 will be processed and disposed of and in such cases, there is no need to file application in new forms.
The Commission has ordered Annual Summary Revision with reference to 01.01.2023 as the qualifying date in all States except the Poll Going States.
EPIC-AADHAR linking
For linking of AADHAR number with Electoral Roll data, provision has been made in the modified registration forms to seek Aadhaar details of electors. A new Form-6B has also been introduced for collecting Aadhaar number of existing electors. However, no application for inclusion of name in electoral roll shall be denied and no entries in electoral roll shall be deleted for inability of an individual to furnish or intimate Aadhaar Number.
It has been emphasized that while handling Aadhaar number of the applicants under no circumstances should it go public. If the electors’ information is required to put for public display, the Aadhaar details must be removed or masked.
A Time bound drive is being started w.e.f. 01.8.22 for collection of Aadhaar number of the existing electors. Furnishing of Aadhaar number is purely voluntary. Objective of the programme is to establish the identity of electors and authentication of entries in Electoral Rol