Aadhaar Linkage to Voter ID on the Agenda at Key Election Commission Meeting
New Delhi ( The Uttam Hindu): With the aim of increasing transparency in the electoral process, the process of linking voter ID to Aadhaar card can now gain momentum. On the lines of PAN card, the Election Commission is seriously considering the plan to link voter identity card (EPIC) to Aadhaar. In this regard, the Election Commission is going to hold an important meeting next week, in which senior officials of the Home Ministry, Law Ministry and Aadhaar issuing institution UIDAI will participate. The main goal of this initiative is to identify fake and duplicate voters from the voter list and remove them. According to the Indian Express report, the Election Commission started collecting Aadhaar numbers voluntarily from voters after the 2021 amendment to the Representation of the People Act, 1951. However, the Election Commission has not yet linked the Aadhaar and voter ID databases. The aim of this process was to cleanse the voter list and identify duplicate voter registrations, but linking Aadhaar has not yet been made mandatory.
Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, Election Commissioner Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Election Commissioner Vivek Joshi will discuss this important issue with Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan, Legislative Department Secretary Rajiv Mani and UIDAI CEO Bhuvnesh Kumar on March 18. This meeting is taking place at a time when the Trinamool Congress has raised the issue of voters having the same EPIC number in some states including West Bengal. On this, the Election Commission has admitted that in some states the same number was issued again due to wrong alphanumeric series. The Election Commission had also recently announced that voters who have been issued duplicate EPIC numbers will be provided with new numbers within the next three months. The Commission has clarified that having the same EPIC number does not mean that the voters are fake, but every voter can vote only in the constituency where he is registered.
