Today Delhi went for assembly polls. The turnout for polls should apparently a bit higher because of recent attacks on Mumbai and high voter turnout in Kashmir and even far off US(I think it’ll effect some people). This was the second time since I turned 18(voting age) that I went to caste my vote considering it my responsibility and having faith in democracy though being skeptical about the election candidates.
Keen to caste my vote I went to vote the first thing in the morning. I was told that cell phones are not allowed inside the premises so I left them at home and picked my Voter ID and a voter slip which had details like voter number, voting center etc. I was joined with a friend and we walked down towards our polling center( a school nearby). The police constable at the gate told that phones are not allowed and we replied that we were not carrying any, which he believed easily and let us in without frisking. Apparently frisking people which is common place in metro trains, shopping malls etc is not really necessary at a polling center.
Upon reaching the room in which we were supposed to caste our votes I was surprised to see two gentlemen from our apartment seated with the voter list from our society and marking who all are turning up to vote. I certainly did not expect to see them or any familiar faces in there(on asking a friend I was told that they are supporters of two main parties and are on some sort of duty to ensure fairness). Next step was to mark my attendance their and getting marked by ink to certify that I’ve voted and to ensure that I can’t vote again. Here also, the lady on duty was marking ink on people’s middle fingers only to be told by a gentleman(who apparently came from the adjoining room) that she is supposed to mark ink on the index finger.
The last step was to caste vote on an electronic machine, which I did eventually but couldn’t help feeling really bad about the whole set up and their unprofessional approach. If we can do our duties responsibly why can’t they ?