NCRWC Report’s 50% plus one vote norm back in buzz

By Manish Anand

New Delhi, September 13: The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (NCRWC) had made extensive recommendations to weed out non-serious non-serious candidates in elections, while also calling for run off contests. Justice M. N. Venkatachalaiah-headed Commission’s report is widely seen to have suggested the possibilities of the direct election of the prime minister and fixing the tenures of the Lok Sabha and the state legislatures, which could make holding simultaneous elections practical.

In other significant, recommendations, the NCRWC Report had called for run off contests so that the winning candidates polled 50 per cent plus one votes. This is widely seen as a formulation to weed out weaker candidates from the electoral fray.

Now that the special session of parliament is commencing from Monday, September 18, for five days, the buzz in the corridors of the power is growing on the government taking a hard look at some of the recommendations of the NCRWC Report, which was submitted in 2002. The commission was constituted by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2000 at a time when there was an intense debate around the presidential form of government.

In its 51^st recommendation, the NCRWC Report had called for recognizing the “beneficial potential of the system of run off contest electing the representative winning on the basis of 50% plus one vote polled, as against the first-past-the-post system”. The commission had based the argument on the premise that the measure would help ushering in a more representative democracy.

The Commission had called upon the government and the Election Commission to examine the issue of prescribing a minimum of 50% plus one vote for election in all its aspects. The Commission had suggested that the affected parties be consulted on implementing the recommendations, while calling for a wider sensitization of the stakeholders.

Power corridors are buzzing with claims that 600 copies, 300 each in English and Hindi, were printed of the report National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (NCRWC) last week. The buzz is gaining intensity as suspense prevails over the possible agenda of the special session of parliament, commencing from September 18 for five days.

The report had also called for discouraging independent candidates in elections by enhancing thresholds to forfeit deposits and even debarring those who lose polls too often. It had suggested that “independent candidates should be discouraged and only those who have a track record of having won any local election or who are nominated by at least twenty elected members of Panchayats, Municipalities or other local bodies be allowed to contest for Assembly or Parliament”.

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About The Author

Manish Anand

Manish Anand is a senior journalist with more than two decades of hardcore reporting on beats such as Prime Minister’s Office, Parliament, BJP, Congress, Planning Commission, NITI Aayog, and scores of Union Ministries.

His past has been with The New Indian Express, The Asian Age/Deccan Chronicle, and The Statesman.

For about 15 years, Manish was also a regular commentator and host for talks on AIR on foreign affairs.

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