Home Ministry accepts Election Commission’s recommendation to make bribing of voters in elections a cognizable offence

The Home Ministry, taking forward the process of electoral reforms, has formulated a draft cabinet note on making bribing of voters, in cash or kind, a cognizable offence under the Criminal Procedure Code. A cognizable offence, under the Code of Criminal Procedure, is an offence for which a police officer has the authority to make an arrest without a warrant.

As the law stands at present, bribing voters, in cash or kind, during elections is a non-cognizable offence under sections 171B/171E of the Indian Penal Code, which attracts only up to one-year of imprisonment or fine as a punishment.

The Election Commission of India (ECI), in 2012, had requested the Union Home Ministry to initiate steps to amend the first schedule of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, to make bribing of voters, in cash or kind, a cognizable offence and also to increase punishment up to two years.

The suggestion of Election commission has been accepted by the Government. The Home Ministry, in a letter dated December 22, 2014, has informed the poll panel that the process to amend the Cr. PC has been "initiated". The ministry's letter was in response to the poll panel's query, dated December 11, 2013, regarding the status of the suggestion to make electoral bribery a cognizable offence. 

If the suggestion of the Election Commission to amend the the first schedule of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, to make bribing of voters, in cash or kind, a cognizable offence comes to pass, it would act as a tougher deterrent for candidates to engage in bribing of voters, given the fact that the Police would then have the authority to register a crime straightaway on receipt of information about the incident of bribery and even arrest such candidate/s without waiting for a warrant from the jurisdictional magistrate.