August 01, 2007	Wednesday	Rajab 16, 1428

LAHORE, July 31: The Election Commission may set aside the condition of presenting the computerised national identity cards for voter registration, Dawn has learnt.

Sources say that the commission will direct its enumerators to accept any other evidence of age for enrolment, including the old national identity card, driving licence, passport, academic certificates in which the date of birth is printed, a certificate by the local union council and the birth certificate issued by a municipal body at any tier.

The sources say the EC in its meeting on Wednesday will work out a fresh schedule to complete the task of preparing electoral rolls.

A report will also be put in order for the Supreme Court with the submission that the commission has started taking measures in compliance with its instructions issued on July 26, the sources said.

The EC may take another four to five months to complete the voters’ lists across the country for which a fresh door-to-door enumeration will be taken up, say the sources, adding that the process may eventually have an impact on the schedule of elections.

Talking to Dawn, EC secretary Kanwar Dilshad Ahmad declined to divulge details of the measures taken for the job and the timeframe for the remaining work.

He also declined to comment on the Supreme Court’s observation that a large number of eligible voters might be deprived of their right to vote as the draft electoral rolls showed certain telling flaws.

The only remark he made was that it was a ‘sensitive matter’ and the EC was trying its best to meet the constitutional and legal obligations in this regard. He said that the EC would explain its position in the Supreme Court.

However, sources in the commission said that the EC would re-engage enumerators, mostly teachers from government schools, after the summer vacations.

The enumerators would re-conduct an exercise to enrol all the eligible voters in another door-to-door campaign, said the sources, adding that the EC had already completed about 70 per cent of the job and not much time would be required for completing the task.

The sources said the condition of producing the CNIC for enrolment as a voter was made mandatory after the Electoral Rolls Act, 1974, was amended on September 27, 2000, by an act of parliament.

The Election Commission of Pakistan subsequently amended Rule 3 of the Electoral Rolls Rules, 1974, to make the production of the CNIC compulsory for registration as voter since the production of the CNIC was now a law and the

EC prepared earlier electoral rolls within the purview of the law.