By IANS,
Bhopal : The Election Commission is preparing Braille signs for some polling booths in Madhya Pradesh to help blind voters exercise their franchise, an official said Tuesday.
“Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) in some centres will have Braille script to enable the visually challenged persons to cast their votes in the Lok Sabha elections,” said state’s Chief Electoral Officer J.S. Mathur.
“This is the first experiment of its kind in the state in pursuance with the directive of the Supreme Court,” Mathur told IANS.
The apex court had directed the Election Commission of India to ensure that all EVMs are equipped with Braille signs for the benefit of those who cannot see.
The Braille strips will have names of candidates and other details. Braille symbols would be installed on the EVMs so that visually handicapped people don’t have any problem in selecting the candidate of their choice, the official said.
“For the first time, the (Election) Commission was mulling over to provide this facility to the visually challenged persons” in some districts, where there are more blind people and “had acquired the knowledge of how to cast their vote by using the Braille script”, the official said.
Mathur said the survey to find out places having a large number of visually challenged people who know Braille language was still underway.