Hyderabad:Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalaswami said the Election Commission was pressing for a set of electoral reforms including mandating that a candidate secure 50 per cent plus one vote of the total votes polled in an election.

"There can be a run-off poll if any candidate fails to secure the stipulated percentage of votes. Yes, there could be a problem in conducting the run-off polls but this that is inevitable," the CEC said.

Gopalaswami said there should be a "fixed term of office to the legislatures" to avoid premature dissolution of the House and thus constant elections.

"We are quite tired of conducting election after election," he said delivering the Sardar Vallabhai Patel memorial lecture on Election Management: The Changing Paradigm" at the SVP National Police Academy here on Monday.

Pointing to the disturbing trends in electoral politics, the CEC said civil servants should be barred from joining political party at least five years after resigning or retiring from service. "Let this start from the CEC and the election commissioners," he said.

Civil servants neutrality was often breached in the conduct of elections as there was a lot of misuse of government servants, especially police.

"A worrying factor is the deficit of integrity of thought and action among the civil servants. These days many civil servants are joining one political party or the other just on the eve of the elections," he said.

Stating that the Election Commission wanted Parliament to pass a legislation to bar persons charged with heinous crimes from contesting the elections, Gopalaswami regretted that it did not pass muster as the members of Parliament raised
concern over foisting of "false cases."

He said 18.18 per cent of the candidates who stood for Lok Sabha in 2004 had criminal cases pending against them. In Uttar Pradesh, 38.30 per cent and in Punjab 17.09 per cent of the candidates in 2007 had a criminal record, he added

Replying to a question raised by an IPS probationer, the CEC said state-funding of election campaigns was a difficult task, for there would be too many independents and non-serious candidates contesting the polls. "Its not possible," he said.

On proportional representation in Parliament, he observed it was a solution with many problems. "It may be ideal but it is debatable whether it works," Gopalaswami said.

Meanwhile, National Police Academy Director G S Rajagopal chaired a meeting that was attended by joint director Santosh Macherla and other senior officials.

Source : DNA