The Election Commission of India has worked out a way to ensure a smooth polling process for voters in Karnataka. In Bengaluru, polling booths will be equipped with facial recognition technology after concerns were raised by activists about privacy.

The first-of-its-kind system will be piloted in one polling station — Room no. 2, Government Ramnarayan Chellaram College on Palace Road, near the office of the Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer on May 10.

How will it work?

To be a part of the system, voters will be required to use EC’s Chunavana mobile application following which they will enter their Elector’s Photo Identity Card (EPIC) number, and mobile number and an OTP will be sent to their registered numbers. After this, voters will have to upload a selfie on the app.

According to Moneycontrol, after the registration process, voters will undergo a facial recognition scanner once they reach the polling booth. If the photo matches that in the EC’s database, they would no longer need to provide documents and will be cleared to cast their votes.

With this system, EC officials say, cases of bogus voting and electoral malpractices while reducing long queues.

The advantages

Karnataka Special Officer (Elections) AV Surya Sen told Moneycontrol, “We identified this booth in Shivaji Nagar for the pilot project since it has only around 300 voters compared to some 1,500 voters in other booths and also due to its proximity to the CEO’s office.”

“Booth Level Officers (BLOs) are visiting all the households of the voters in this booth and explaining the new technology. It’s not mandatory, and those who do not want to opt for this facility can follow the traditional way. There will be a separate queue for voters availing of this,” he added.

He also noted the many advantages of the system. “One, it will cut down the queue/waiting time for voting. Two, less manpower is needed. For instance, instead of four polling officers at a booth, only three can be deployed because there’s no need for further checks/verification due to this face recognition technology,” he explained.

The novel idea was brought about after students of the Department of Computing Technologies from SRM University won a 30-hour offline hackathon to tackle voting apathy.

Apart from escaping long waiting lines, the Chunavana mobile application will also tell voters about the available parking spaces near the polling booth. They can also check the queue status on the app in real-time.

A pick-and-drop facility has also been arranged for the elderly and differently-abled voters.

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