People for Lok Satta welcomes voting rights for NRIs

United States based "People for Lok Satta" organisation (peopleforloksatta.org) has welcomed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's announcement that NRIs would be able to vote in the 2014 general elections. In a statement released here today, People for Lok Satta said that it had been fighting for such a right for the last one year.

"Many times, the names are removed from the list by the authorities with the assumption that NRIs are not available in India for voting. We strongly feel that the duel citizenship holders should also exercise their vote because of their contributions for development of India. And unfortunately this provision is not there due to the present rules" it said. PFL teams in Boston, Houston, California campaigned regarding this and we had tremendous response from the NRI community.

The proposed measure would enable NRIs to play an active role in changing the political culture in India, it said.