New Delhi, Mar 19
Supreme Court on Friday asked a petitioner, who had filed a petition seeking directions to replace party symbols on Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) with the details of the contesting candidate, to serve a copy of the same to the Attorney General of India.
A three-judge bench comprising CJI SA Bobde, Justices AS Bopanna and V Subramanian gave the order while considering a petition filed by BJP BJP leader Advocate Ashwini Upadhyaya seeking to include the photograph, age and qualifications of contesting candidates in Electronic Voting Machines, instead of symbols.
Senior Advocate Vikas Singh appearing for the petitioner argued that the best solution to weed corruption and criminalisation in politics is to replace political party symbols on ballot and EVM with name, age, educational qualification and a photograph of the candidates.
The petition further stated that ballot and EVM, without political party symbols, have many benefits as they will help electors to vote and support intelligent, diligent and honest candidates.
“Ballot and EVMs, without political party symbol, will control dictatorship of political party bosses in ticket distribution and force them to give ticket to those who religiously work for people’s welfare,” Mr Singh quoted the plea.
Mr Singh also submitted that the elections laws originally did not contemplate symbols.
“We are not issuing notice at this stage. You serve copy on the Attorney General”, the Chief Justice told Senior Advocate.