Saarc EC officials confce starts today
Chief Election Commissioners and senior election officials of the South Asian region will begin a three-day conference in New Delhi today to share experience of best practices in election administration and management.
Election Commission of India is hosting the Third Conference of Heads of Election Management Bodies (EMBs) of member countries of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) on April 30 to May 20.
Bangladesh Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad left Dhaka for New Delhi yesterday morning to lead the Bangladesh delegation at the conference.
The event, which will bring together CECs and top senior election officials, will be inaugurated by Chief Election Commissioner of India Dr SY Quraishi.
Officials said the conference will build on the initiatives and exchanges discussed at the previous conferences. Discussions will also focus on the final shape of the Forum of SAARC Election Management Bodies, which has been approved in principle at the last conference held in Islamabad.
Some of the important topics to be discussed are: empowerment of election management bodies; inclusive elections (gender issues, marginalised sections, minorities etc.), voters education, controlling money power in elections, technology for cost-effective elections etc.
The idea of holding such conferences took concrete shape at the 37th session of the standing committee of Saarc, held at Thimphu, in April, 2010. Bangladesh hosted the first conference in May 2010, where initial discussions on creating a Forum of SAARC EMBs were also held.
The second conference was held in Islamabad by the Election Commission of Pakistan. It focused on experience sharing, and also discussed the draft charter of the proposed forum.
It adopted a resolution to establish the forum. A number of initiatives on mutual exchanges and training activities were discussed, and bilateral arrangements were tied up between member commissions.
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