A new way Indians can vote while living abroad

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NEW YORK – With about 16 million Indians living outside of India, students and workers now have the option of voting during Parliament and Assembly elections when they are not in India.

Senior Deputy Election Commissioner Umesh Sinha and Deputy Election Commissioner Sandeep Saxena, made a visit to the Indian Consulate on Monday, July 31 to announce this new initiative.

As long as they have their Indian passports, students and workers who studying and working outside of India and wish to vote in the Parliament and Assembly elections can register online at http://eci.nic.in/eci/eci.html and either download the ballot which will be sent back to India by mail or have a proxy who lives in their constitute go and vote on their behalf.

“The moment elections are announced, you will get an email notification saying that elections are being held and this is the date to cast the vote. Once all of the candidates have been selected it will create a ballot for each individual voter,” said Saxena.

“You will then get a pin number and your registered phone number with which you will use to log on, to download your own encrypted file along with two envelopes; one for which you will put the ballot in and the other to put the first envelope in along with the declaration,” he added.

The envelope should then be mailed back to India as it will already have the mailing address on it.

This initiative has come after the Indian Election Commission saw a decline in the amount of votes casted during the Parliament and Assembly elections.

States have yet to announce how they will handle the way of casting a ballot while living abroad during their own elections.