Pursuit of the Franchise

Me and wife have finally been successful in getting ourselves registered as “voters” for the current parliamentary elections. But the pursuit of this goal has been long and interesting .

Our pursuit of the franchise started way back in 2003. Being in the Armed Forces, we were sent forms from the Headquarters in New Delhi. Everyone had to fill up the forms and send them back for taking up with the Election Commission. A part of it was to be sent to your representative in the hometown. We did all that, my father went to the local electoral office and tried to register our name, but nothing happened. The entire exercise turned out to be a damp squib with lot of wastage of precious government money and bales of paper and of course increasing the carbon footprint drastically.

Inspite of the uselessness, the incident triggered my father to continuously pursue me to get myself registered as a voter and get myself an EPIC (Electoral Photo Identity Card or the Voter’s Card). While he started on the primary premise that it is an important and valid identity proof, I countered that my Armed Forces Identity Card and Passport was good enough. He was smart. He changed his tack and chided me no end that being a responsible citizen of the country I cannot afford to be lackadaisical about something as important as exercising my franchise. His efforts came to a peak when the West Bengal state election machinery swung into action in 2005. Forms were taken, couriered to Mumbai with clarifications and important places to be filled up marked in pencil. We (me, my wife and sister) filled up the form, prepared the certificates required and sent it back. My father dutifully deputed my mom to deposit the form. The photo clicking session was on in phases and it coincided with our visit home. So I had no option but to visit the local school which was the epicenter of activity. One old, typically Bong Govt babu saw my slip and asked me to go to someone else. The next babu saw the slip and gave me a thick bunch of papers and directed with the well known gruffness “find out if your name is there”. After scanning a few sheets, suddenly I spotted my grandmother’s name followed by my parents and sister. But the list didn’t have me or my wife on it!! On pursuing it with the babu regarding how everyone but we are there, we had this interesting conversation:

Babu: Why are you trying to register now when you are 28 years old?
Me: I have been studying outside and have been serving in the Armed Forces since I completed my studies. I tried registering for the postal ballot last time but nothing happened.
Babu: Then if you have not felt the need to register to vote in the last 10 years, why are you bothering now. Go to the district headquarters and try your luck there.

I was flummoxed. But I was not cowed down. Next I went to the District Headquarters and it turned out to be an experience in being shunted from one desk to another. And that was enough for me to give up any attempts to exercise my franchise.

Cut to 2008.

NGOs and groups have been highly active and I came across the mass campaign by Tata tea – Jaago Re. Registering on the website was a cake walk with the exact address for form submission provided on the electronic form generated by the website. With all proof documents, photographs and the forms, I went to the designated office. People were courteous and helpful. The form was accepted, another guy checked it out on his computer database and gave me the relevant ID nos and it was done! I was still skeptical as the last couple of weeks my searches on the Maharashtra Election Commission website was coming to naught. And then yesterday I saw that my name was there. So yippee! We are finally going to vote. And we are excited.

Those of you who think the pursuit has ended are a little mistaken. Our names have some hilarious errors. My name has now my father’s name as my middle name and it is going to be an exercise to convince that we do not use our father’s name as our middle name. My father in law has been changed from Subhendu Bhusan Dasgupta to someone called Subhendu Ghosh and my wife has now become Devasree Subhendu Ghosh! Ofcourse getting this corrected would be much easier. Thanks to technology and changing mindsets.

So let’s go vote and be part of the choice!