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India Today
05-05-2025
- Business
- India Today
Election Commission to launch single-point digital platform soon
In a significant step towards streamlining electoral services, the Election Commission of India (ECI) will launch a single-point digital platform called ECINET to integrate the commission's 40 existing mobile and web applications, the ECI said on Sunday. The ECI revealed that ECINET is under development to ensure smooth access to electoral services for nearly 100 crore voters and the entire electoral workforce. Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar is leading the effort and is expected to modernise India's electoral commission, in a press statement, stated that ECINET will consolidate popular applications like Voter Helpline, Voter Turnout, cVIGIL, Suvidha 2.0, ESMS, Saksham, and the KYC App, all of which have collectively recorded over 5.5 crore downloads. These facilities, hitherto accessible via individual portals, will now be accessible via an integrated app."The platform shall provide a smooth and user-friendly interface for electors, election officials, political parties, and civil society," the ECI #ECINET to facilitate electoral servicesA single-point App for stakeholders;to subsume over existing 40 IT AppsTo benefit nearly 100 crore electors & entire electoral machineryRead in detail : #ECI Election Commission of India (@ECISVEEP) May 4, 2025 The officials added that the decision has been taken to minimise complexity for users by doing away with the requirement of downloading and managing multiple applications. With ECINET, services such as voter registration, reporting of grievances, polling station information, and election statistics will be present at one digital is not only meant for the voters. It will benefit more than 10.5 lakh Booth Level Officers (BLOs), about 15 lakh Booth Level Agents (BLAs) recruited by political parties, almost 45 lakh polling officials, 15,597 Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs), 4,123 Electoral Registration Officers (EROs), and 767 District Election Officers (DEOs).As per the ECI, ECINET was created after taking extensive consultations with 36 Chief Electoral Officers, 767 DEOs, and 4,123 EROs. It is founded on findings derived from 76 in-house ECI publications. The platform is at an advanced development stage and will be subjected to stringent cybersecurity testing and trial phases before its public project is also a part of the Election Commission's move to enhance user experience (UX) and interface design (UI) so that citizens from all walks of life can access electoral services online. Authorities believe that this platform will help increase participation in the electoral process and narrow the digital deployment of ECINET is expected within the next few months, and additional information, including a launch date, will be available shortly.
Hindustan Times
05-05-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
Data by presiding officers to be final in the event of conflict: ECI
The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Sunday said that in the event of any 'conflict' in voter turnout data, the primary figures filled in statutory forms by booth-level presiding officers will take precedence, with the crucial clarification coming amid growing scrutiny over the accuracy of data shared on poll body's official platforms. The announcement comes at a time when the ECI is preparing to launch ECINET — a new digital interface for voters, poll officials and political parties which will integrate over 40 of its existing mobile and web applications, including the Voter Turnout App. According to the poll body, the platform is being developed following an extensive consultative exercise involving 36 chief electoral officers, 767 district election officers, and 4,123 electoral registration officers across states and Union territories. ECINET will allow users to access electoral data on desktops and smartphones, ECI said in a press release on Sunday. 'To ensure that data is as accurate as possible, the data on ECINET will be entered solely by authorised ECI officials. Entry by the concerned official would ensure that the data made available to stakeholders is as accurate as possible. However, in case of any conflict, the primary data as duly filled in statutory forms will prevail,' it added. The ECI statement effectively means that for voter turnout figures, Form 17C — which records booth-wise voter turnout data filled by presiding officers — will be treated as the final record in case of discrepancies with data displayed on its portal and app. In addition to the Voter Turnout App, ECINET will also absorb platforms such as the Voter Helpline, cVIGIL (for reporting model code violations), the Affidavit Portal, and others. The initiative aims to benefit nearly one billion eligible voters, 1.05 million booth level officers, 1.5 million booth level agents of political parties, nearly 4.5 million polling officials, and 15,597 assistant electoral registration officers. The clarification gains significance amid growing criticism from various opposition parties, which accused ECI of voter data manipulation. Last month, senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi alleged at an event in the that the poll body was 'compromised' and that 'something is wrong with the system'. 'The Election Commission gave us a voting figure for 5.30 pm, and between 5.30 pm and 7.30 pm, 65 lakh (6.5 million) voters voted. This is physically impossible. For a voter to vote, it takes approximately three minutes and, if you do the math, it would mean that there were lines of voters till 2 am but this did not happen,' the former Congress chief had said. Rejecting the claims, ECI underlined that 6.40 crore (64 million) electors who reached the polling stations from 7 am to 6 pm voted in the Maharashtra polls, which effectively meant about 58 lakh (5.8 million) votes were polled per hour on an hour. 'Going by these average trends, nearly 116 lakh (11.6 million) voters could have voted in the last two hours. Therefore, casting of 65 lakh (6.5 million) votes by electors in two hours is much below the average hourly voting trend,' ECI had said in a statement, days after Gandhi's allegations.
The Hindu
04-05-2025
- Politics
- The Hindu
Election Commission to develop new digital interface for voters, other stakeholders
The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Sunday (May 4, 2025) announced that it was developing a new, user-friendly digital interface for voters and other stakeholders such as election officials, political parties and the civil society. The new one-stop platform, ECINET, will integrate and reorient over 40 of the EC's existing mobile and web applications. It will subsume existing apps, such as the Voter Helpline app, Voter Turnout app, cVIGIL, Suvidha 2.0, ESMS, Saksham and the KYC app, which together had clocked over 5.5 crore downloads. The EC's new initiative comes amid allegations made by Opposition parties about voter roll manipulations, duplication of elector's photo identity cards (EPICs), as well as abnormalities in updating voter turnout data. The ECINET will have an aesthetic user interface (UI) and a simplified user experience (UX) by providing a singular platform for all election-related activities. This move is also designed to alleviate the burden of users, who currently have to download and navigate multiple apps and remember different login details, the poll body said in a statement. It has already reached an advanced stage of development and rigorous trials are being conducted to ensure smooth functionality, ease of use, and robust cybersecurity measures. It is being developed after an elaborate consultative exercise involving 36 Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) of all the States and Union Territories, 767 District Election Officers (DEOs) and 4,123 Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) of their States and UTs and after reviewing 76 publications comprising 9,000 pages of the electoral framework, instructions and handbooks issued by the EC from time to time. The new digital interface will enable users to access relevant electoral data on their desktops and smartphones. To ensure that data are as accurate as possible, ECINET data will be entered solely by authorised EC officials. However, in case of any conflict, the primary data as duly filled in statutory forms will prevail. The platform was proposed by the Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar during a recent conference of CEOs, EC sources said. The new initiative is expected to benefit nearly 100 crore electors and the entire electoral machinery comprising over 10.5 lakh Booth Level Officers, around 15 lakh Booth Level Agents appointed by political parties, nearly 45 lakh polling officials, 15,597 Assistant EROs, 4,123 EROs and 767 DEOs across the country.
