Online voting for TNMC polls: HC orders notice to State, NMC

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Friday ordered notice to the Tamil Nadu Government and National Medical Commission in a petition for adopting the online voting system with a single-use password instead of the postal voting method for the Tamil Nadu Medical Council (TNMC) elections.

Justice R Suresh Kumar passed the direction while admitting a petition filed by Kancheepuram-based doctor N Karthikeyan.

The petitioner sought direction from the court to the TNMC to use the online voting system with a single-use user id and password arrangement instead of the postal voting system in the TNMC elections.

Advocate Suhrith Parthasarathy for the petitioner submitted that the postal voting system was introduced before in Independence and the same need not be accommodated now for the TNMC elections.

As there were no modern technologies to engage a voter who resided in a distant place, the postal voting system was followed. The current digital can rectify the defects and malpractice by replacing the conservatory postal voting system, the petitioner added.

Recording the submissions, the judge ordered the registry to list this matter along with the other pending cases related to the TNMC elections. The State, NMC and TNMC were directed to file their responses on December 5.