CASTING VOTE

 When MPs can abstain from voting of important bills in parliament, why should the poor voter be penalised for abstaining.  

I too agree with advchennai, lot of issues when came for vote how many M.P.'s denying their duty and responsibility towards the public as not thinking that they are representing them, simply for the political stunt and horse trading etc... they are playing at the time of casting their vote on the bills... exactly comparing to this poor voter should be punished for abstaining is not reasonable... and fair.. well said .....advchennai..

Dear All,

This compulsory voting business has always puzzled me. In Australia made voting compulsory in 1924. It is well regarded by the Australians who see it as a part of their civic duty. Those who don’t vote have to pay a nominal fine. There is no sense of infringement of people’s rights. The turnout in Australia has never fallen below 90 percent.
Meanwhile, with a population of 3.5 million Uruguay has a system of compulsory voting since 1971. In case of no show on poll day, Uruguayans have to justify on a case by case basis their absence or they face a fine. The Swiss have to pay a fine of three francs, the Argentineans 10 to 20 pesos and Cypriots face a Cyprus £200 fine, while in some other countries non-voters can also face imprisonment,

  According to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, In Belgium those who don’t vote find it difficult to find employment in the public sector and in Greece they have trouble procuring passport and driving license.

The compulsory voting idea in India is not feasible .A major problem that plagues a democracy like India's is bogus voting. In contrast, Australians probably wouldn't know what bogus voting is. The reasons may be partly cultural, but I think compulsory voting also makes such kinds of electoral fraud systemically impossible. The failure to vote is a powerful statement, since it decreases turnout and that decreases a government’s mandate. By forcing those who do not want to vote to the ballot box, a government can make its mandate much larger than the people actually wish it to be. Those who fought for democracy fought for the right to vote not the compulsion to vote. If large proportion of the population decided not to vote it would impossible to make every non-voter pay the fine or take criminal action. Even if they sent demand letters to all these people, they could not take all those who refused to pay to court. Ironically, this measure hurts most those who the proposition is trying to enfranchise because they are least able to pay. If they are not voting it indicates there is a fundamental problem with democracy; forcing people to vote cannot solve such a problem. It merely causes resentment.
 

Source:  https://www.idea.int/

to   ZARINA :

quote :
The Chairman has a casting vote .... "
unquote :

In typical circumstances, the Chairman is the presiding officer and not entitled to vote.

It also means that when there are only two parties and when there are equal number of votes for a resolution (or a cause),  the chairman can bias himself and cast an extra vote favouring either anyone of the two parties, thus effectively making one party win the resolution, even though it also means that the rest of the 50% voters are made fools, by the chairman's casting vote,  which otherwise in circumstances, the particular resolution should have been abandoned.

HOWEVER,  It also means that a "dead-lock" over a very important resolution can be broken by the Chairman, by using his "one reserved"   EXTRA vote, in such dead-lock situtations.  Such vote can be exercised only after all the votes have been conclusively counted.

Keep Smiling .... Hemant Agarwal

Bad politicians are elected by good citizens who do not vote. Having said that, things don't exist in vaccuum.

Ifyou want to force people to vote, you need to let the people have an option to reject all the candidates. As of now, it is an extremely complicated procedure for a voter to do this. Along with the candidates's symbol on the ballot paper, a clear option for rejecting all candidates should be present on the ballot paper itself.

Further, the option of rejecting all the candidates should mean something. For example, if majority of the voters reject all the candidates then the candidates should be removed from contention.

WIthout these provisions, cumpulsory voting is a bad idea.

www.hanumant.com