Bar candidates with criminal records, says EC Qureshi

London, Aug 6 (PTI) Strongly pitching for barring
candidates with criminal records from contesting elections in
the country, India's Election Commissioner S.Y. Qureshi has
said the government should enact a law in this regard.

"We want candidates with criminal records to be barred
from contesting elections. For that the government has to pass
a law which has not been done yet. There is a need to do a lot
more to see (that) criminals are barred from elections," he
said while delivering a lecture at the Nehru Centre here.

The Commission, he said, also wanted a ban on exit or
opinion poll as they could be manipulated and may have
"unfair" influence on the outcome of the elections.

Asked whether the criminalisation of politics was on the
increase, Qureshi said, "I feel, it is on the decrease because
of certain measures taken by the Commission like compulsory
filling of affidavits by candidates about their pasts."

He said in the Assembly elections last year about one
hundred candidates with criminal records were elected as
against 210 such people in the previous year.

In a bid to eliminate bogus voting, the Election
Commission of India will introduce electoral rolls with
voters' photographs in the next general elections, Qureshi
said while speaking on "Democracy and Elections in India".

"In the next general election, the electoral rolls
itself will have photographs of voters. Hopefully, it will
work to eliminate bogus voters." The photographs on rolls
will be in addition to the voters' photo identity cards.

Qureshi said, the delimitation of parliamentary
constituencies will be completed by August 31." Then we will
be ready for general election, due before May next."

Replying to queries, Qureshi said "the time was not
ripe for making voting compulsory in India."