622 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
*Mr. Chairman : Amendments moved :
(i) After part (e) of clause 59, add the following new part as part (f):
“(f) any person subjected to preventive detention under any law for the time being in force.”
(ii) After part (e) of clause 59, add the following new parts:
“(f) the candidates, their election agent and polling agents ;
(g) the President, the Governors and the Rajpramukh of the States.”
Shri Sonavane (Bombay) : I rise to support part (f) of the amendment standing in the name of Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava. I also support the addition of the new part (f). It is necessary to allow a candidate to vote through the post because he may be in a place which is not a constituency in which he is registered as the candidate. It may not be possible for him to go to that particular constituency and so he should be allowed to vote through the post. Similar circumstances may arise in the case of the election agents and polling agents also and so they also must be allowed this facility. When they have to work as election or polling agents, they may have to go to different places and they may not be able to be present in the constituency in which their names occur in the electoral rolls. So it is but proper that this facility should be extended to them also.
Dr. Ambedkar : Sir, Mr. Kapoor has placed before us three propositions, namely, that the facilities for voting by post may be extending to persons under detention, and to candidates, their election agents and polling agents and thirdly, to the President, the Governors and the Rajpramukhs of the States.
I should like to say at the very outset that postal ballot is a very dangerous thing—one of the most dangerous thing that I have come across. I have noticed candidates appointing persons to go to various individuals who become entitled to voting by post, collect their ballot papers, get their signatures, and just post it themselves and thus a vast amount of illogical pressure—something like requisitioning—is brought about. I therefore think that this system ought to be confined to the shortest extent possible.
*P.D., Vol. 12, Part II, 21st May 1951, pp. 9207-09.