All Indians either have or must have the Aadhaar Card. Without it, getting food grains, creating a bank account, registering a title deed and other such administrative jobs can be very difficult. Now, according to the Election Laws (Amendment) Bill, passed by the LokSabha, Aadhaar Card will also be linked to the voter ID.
India’s Law Minister Kiren Rijiju, who brought the Bill to the Parliament, maintained that the citizen doesn’t need to link his/her Aadhaar Card. Nonetheless, linking of Aadhaar with the voter ID means that a person who wants to verify their residence will have to provide their Aadhaar number. The electoral officer may ask Aadhaar number of those who are already in the electoral roll for authentication, and those who have names in more than one constituency or more than once in the same constituency.
It is up to the citizen to provide their Aadhaar number. If not, they can provide other documents, too. The objective of the Bill is, ostensibly, to stop the confusion of one person being enrolled in different constituencies or more than once in the same constituency.
In addition to this, the Election (Amendment) Bill sought to change the option of ‘wife’ to ‘spouse’ so the option is gender-neutral; this is strange because same-sex marriages are not recognised by India’s Supreme Court. Moreover, according to the Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, as per the Central Government, the word ‘spouse’ refers to the wife or the husband. This rule only makes sense when you consider that an army man’s wife is regarded as a service voter but an army woman’s husband is not. The rule, then, has nothing to do with the LGBTQ+ community as yet, although it could be beneficial for them in the future.
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