Elections are chief cause of graft, says voting watchdog

Elections are the biggest source of corruption in the country, according to Chief Election Commissioner S Y Quraishi.

In a system where a candidate spends Rs5-10 crore to get elected, the first thing he or she does is call officials and ask them how they can help him recover the expenditure, Quraishi told a special meeting called by the Election Commission to seek the media's help in boosting voter awareness.

The Election Commission has made ''significant'' progress in making the electoral process more transparent, but only a vigilant electorate can stamp out corruption, he said.

Indicating the limitations of the British parliamentary system as adopted in India, Quraishi said low voter turnout had emerged as a fundamental threat to the country's democracy. ''If 30 per cent of people vote and one of them wins with 12 per cent of that, both the quality of the representation and the legitimacy of governance will suffer,'' he pointed out.

He said the Election Commission is considering instituting a national award for the best media campaign for motivating voter awareness and boosting participation in elections. A jury consisting of eminent people like leading journalists and jurists could be set up to pick the media institution which had run the best campaign, Quraishi suggested.

He also outlined some of the steps the election authority has taken in this direction, such as appointment of community-based booth liaison officers, hand delivery of voter slips before the voting date, and running awareness campaigns in the media.