ONE NATION ONE ELECTION WILL GROW MORE DEMOCRACY CM PARTICIPATES JOINT PARLIAMENT COMMITTEE CM Pushkar Singh Dhami participated in an interaction programme with the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the theme One Nation, One Election at a hotel on Mussoorie Road on Wednesday. On this occasion, he welcomed and congratulated the Chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee Shri P.P. Chaudhary and all the members of the Committee.
The Chief Minister said that ‘One Nation One Election “is an important initiative towards making our democracy more empowered, effective and inclusive. He said that our electoral system has been effective and strong despite diversities, but holding elections at different times leads to repeated code of conduct, due to which all the work of the states comes to a standstill. Whenever elections come, a large number of personnel have to be diverted from basic work and put on election duty. The Chief Minister said that in the last three years, the administrative machinery of the state was deprived of the policy decision-making process for 175 days due to the code of conduct for assembly, Lok Sabha and civic elections in the state. For a state with small and limited resources, these 175 days are important from the point of view of governance.
The Chief Minister said that the entire expenditure of the Assembly elections is borne by the State Government and the expenditure of the Lok Sabha elections is borne by the Central Government. If both the elections are held together, the expenditure burden on the state and central government will be equally halved. Simultaneous conduct of both the elections would result in saving of about 30-35% of the total expenditure. It can be used in many areas of the state like health, education, roads, water, agriculture and women empowerment. The Chief Minister said that the period from June to September in Uttarakhand, along with the Chardham Yatra, also happens to be rainy, so there are many problems due to the election schedule. Also, the election process should not be scheduled at the time of the last quarter of the financial year from January to March. The conduct of high school and intermediate board examinations in the month of February-March puts additional pressure on administrative resources. He said “one nation, one election” is important in states with hilly and heterogeneous geographical conditions like Uttarakhand. The Chief Minister said that in the inaccessible areas of Uttarakhand, it is difficult to reach the polling stations, due to which the process of election takes more time and resources. It is also challenging for voters in the hilly areas to participate in the elections, frequent elections lead to low voter turnout and also decrease the voting percentage. Department of Information and Public Relations.