New Delhi:

The idea of One Country One Election — under discussion for long in the corridors of parliament — will be implemented during the current tenure of the Narendra Modi government, sources have said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had mentioned this in his Independence Day speech this year and the government is committed to implementing it, sources said.

The government has already formed a committee under the chairmanship of former President Ramnath Kovind, which has submitted its report.  The panel has recommended simultaneous elections for the Lok Sabha and state assemblies as a first step, which would be followed by synchronised local body polls within 100 days.

It is likely that the Law Commission will also recommend it soon. The Commission is likely to recommend that all three tiers of government — Lok Sabha, state assemblies and local bodies like municipalities and panchayats — have simultaneous polls starting 2029 and a provision for unity government in cases like hung house or no-confidence motion.

In his Independence Day address last month, PM Modi had made a strong pitch for “One nation, one election”, contending that frequent polls were creating hurdles in the country’s progress.

“The nation has to come forward for ‘one nation, one election’,” he had said.

The BJP had also promised “One Nation One Election” in its manifesto and government sources said they are hopeful that there will be consensus among all parties to implement it, sources said.

The Opposition, though, has staunchly opposed the idea sofar, red-flagging the constitutional issues.

The challenges to its implementation would involve syncing electoral cycles with minimum disruption to governance and there is no clarity dealing with the breaks that would be involved in bringing all states in the same timeline. There is also a marked lack of clarity in the way forward in cases involving dissolution of Houses, President’s Rule, or even a hung Assembly or Parliament.

Regional parties have pointed out their limited resources could hamper them from highlighting local issues to voters, in the face of the din over the Lok Sabha election.

Another area of concern is the recurring cost of procuring EVMS, or electronic voting machines. This, the poll panel has said, will be nearly Rs 10,000 crore every 15 years.

New Delhi:

The newly formed committee to see whether India could hold parliamentary and state assembly elections simultaneously will examine and recommend specific amendments to the Constitution, the Representation of the People Act and any other relevant rules.

The nine-member committee headed by former President Ram Nath Kovind will also check whether the amendments to the Constitution would need ratification by the states, according to the government’s gazette notification today.

It said the committee will start work immediately and give report as soon as possible.

The other members of the committee are Home Minister Amit Shah, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, former Rajya Sabha Leader of Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad, former 15th Finance Commission chairman NK Singh, former Lok Sabha Secretary General  Subhash C Kashyap, senior advocate Harish Salve, and former Chief Vigilance Commissioner Sanjay Kothari.

The Congress party will consult its allies of the newly formed Opposition bloc INDIA on this committee before deciding whether to participate in the feasibility study, sources told NDTV today.

The committee will look into the feasibility of holding not only Lok Sabha and assembly elections simultaneously, but also elections to municipalities and panchayats, according to the gazette notification.

The committee will analyse and recommend possible solutions linked to simultaneous elections if there is a hung house, no-confidence motion, defection, or any such other event.

A single electoral roll and identity card for voters valid for the national, state, civic body and panchayat elections will be explored, the government said in the notification.

The BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have spoken on the need for ‘One Nation, One Election’ on several occasions, and it was also a part of the party’s manifesto for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.

Conducting polls simultaneously was the norm in India until 1967 and four elections were held this way. The practice stopped after some state assemblies were dissolved prematurely in 1968-69. The Lok Sabha was also, for the first time, dissolved a year ahead of schedule in 1970 and mid-term elections had been held in 1971.

In one of the first political reactions to the setting up of the committee, Communist Party of India General Secretary D Raja told NDTV that the BJP is obsessed with ‘one nation, one party’ and it has been jittery since the Opposition united under the INDIA banner.