What happens if a constitutional option is not made avilable to voters in an election?

Question

I am an Indian from India.

Did you know that there is a system in our constitution, as per the 1969 act, in section "49-O" that a person can go to the polling booth, confirm his identity, get his finger marked and convey the presiding election officer that he doesn't want to vote anyone !!!!Yes, such a feature is available, but obviously these seemingly notorious leaders have never disclosed it. This is called "49-O". Why should you go and say "I VOTE NOBODY"... because, in a ward, if a candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has received "49-O" votes more than 123, then that polling will be cancelled and will have to be re-polled.Not only that, but the candidature of the contestants will be removed and they cannot contest the re-polling, since people had already expressed their decision on them.This would bring fear into parties and hence look for genuine candidates for their parties for election.

Answer 1

You should denounce it

Answer 2

Unfortunately, now a days, politicians spread lots of negative sentiments about each other, and often do it in such a malicious way, that voters' minds end up getting an accumulation of messages in their minds that party A is no good, nor is B, nor is C. You clearly feel that the options you were offered were all bad, and that these would suddenly improve drastically if a 49-O vote victory was registered. I wish you were right.
More likely, the same primaries process will produce another similar/equivalent list of candidates, and again only two parties will have sufficient corporate funding backing them to be able to run a marketng campaign capable of beating the opponents.

Also, the system runs te risk of 49-O outcome repeats until a list of constituencies are left completely unrepresented in parliament. Eastern Europe has similarly odd rules in respect to when their election results are anulled if an ambitious minimum turnout level is not achieved. They too, seem to think they can presume that everything will be better the second / third /fourth / ... time around.

Instead of these scilly rules, I would argue that a democracy can be improved if parties and candidates could enforcably be banned from receiving corporate backing money and all backing money. And if parties were formed by the state that consisted of people from the whole of society, including non-rich and non-party-members too, eg one party chooses its panel of presidents for one-year terms by a lottery from all voters that wish to apply, and another choses its panel of party presidents by tournament events where every person that attends is a candidate & has a pack of 10,9,8,7,... vote points to give at the end of discussions, and one party has a panel member from each top 15 religious group, and one party has a panel member from each top 15 trade union.

Answer 3

Oh, I so agree with that. I wish we had an option for D.None of the above. That way we could have our say and still not vote for anyone. It would really improve the quality of those running for offices. Not only that, but it would do away with the attitude of having to vote for the lesser of two evils since neither is a good choice.

Answer 4

This is a very good argument , however our former election commissioner Mr Gill has answered this lucidly . You cant vote for Nobody , because Mr Nobody cannot sit in the parliament

It would be a sheer waste of time and money to implement this course of action , best is to make a good choice , trust me there are good people still out there and holding your leaders accountable to their promises once they are elected . Its important that we as citizens do our civic duties well

Answer 5

thats not a question..., so why ask it... I should think most of the voters know about NOT VOTING is it is their right to do so, and sometimes it can send a message if done enmass...

unfortunately those statistics often get over shadowed by people who just couldn't be bothered to vote... your better voting for some obscure independant, he/she wont win, but your vote will have sent a message.

Answer 6

File a case in court to protect your votes by citing the constitutional provisions.

Answer 7

They do not have this system in England, but the No candidate would get more votes than the legitimate candidates.

Answer 8

Thats disgusting its cheating.Welcome to England & Ireland Yahoo.

Answer 9

Denounce it

Answer 10

I did not know that, thank you for enlightening me.