Polling Booth

Today we had BBMP election in Bangalore.As a citizen of India it is my fundamental right to cast my vote.So I always make it a point to vote whenever opportunity provides itself.Generally I go to the polling booth early in the morning to avoid rush.But today I was late and reached polling booth by 3 pm.When I reached the polling booth it was surprising to see a long queue.There were at least hundred people standing in front of me to cast their vote.

As I stood in the queue the person standing behind me started to talk to me in Kannada.Our area being a village most people speak only in Kannada.I could understand most of what he was saying but could not answer back.He kept on speaking to me for a hour thinking I knew Kannada very well.I was the only person at the polling booth who could not speak Kannada.Its been close to four years I have been living in Karnataka.I regret that I have not yet learned Kannada.In the crowd I could see people of all ages waiting eagerly for their turn to come.No wonder we are the worlds largest functioning democracy.People still have faith in our political system.But suddenly it started raining and the situation became out of control.The queue was broken and there was almost a stampede like situation.No body wanted to stand in a queue but everyone wanted to cast their vote.

The situation was out of control and police was having tough time in controlling the crowd.Most people who were behind me in the queue managed to cast their vote before me.I thought about going home without casting my vote.I waited patiently for more than two hours for my turn to come.The chaos at the polling booth could have lead to a stampede or fight between people.So it made me wonder cant we be making use of latest technology to enable people to cast their vote remotely.This will make people life easier and we may increase the percentage of voting.

We were one of the first countries to have adopted electronic voting machine.Even though many people were apprehensive in the beginning but now it is working well for us.Similarly may be it is time for us to make use of latest technology to make polling process easier,safer and cheaper.One of the solution could be to have an online poll with bio metric identification to avoid fraud.I think this may happen much sooner than we might imagine.Any way we are a country with huge diversity and worlds largest functioning democracy.It is really amazing that most times we do succeed in conducting free and fair elections.