High Commission of India

Lilongwe, Malawi

Voting Right to NRIs

In response to common queries regarding voting rights of overseas Indians, it is clarified that every Indian citizen staying in a foreign country, who has attained the age of 18 years as on first January of the year, and is otherwise eligible to be registered as a voter, can make an application in Form 6A for being registered as a voter in the roll of the part/polling area of the constituency where he is ordinarily resident.

A Non-Resident citizen of India, who is not included in the electoral roll, and who is absenting from his place of ordinary residence in India owing to his employment, education or otherwise is eligible to be registered as a voter in the constituency in which his place of residence in India as mentioned in his passport is located.

In this regard, we would like to facilitate and encourage more NRIs to get their names registered on the electoral rolls. For proper acquaintance with the process and procedures, please visit the website of the Election Commission of India: www.eci.nic.in .

Procedure for registration as a voter by Non-Resident Indians

An application for the purpose is to be filed in the prescribed Form 6A before the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) of the constituency within which the place of ordinary residence of the applicant in India as given in his/her valid passport falls. The application can be presented in person before the ERO or sent by post addressed to the ERO concerned, as per following details:

(a). Form 6A can be downloaded from the link http://eci.nic.in/eci_main/forms/Form-6A.pdf  of Election Commission of India. Form 6A is also available free of cost in the Mission and with the Authorised outsourcing agents. Postal addresses of all EROs are available on the website of Election Commission of India. The application is to be accompanied by one recent passport size coloured photograph (with light background and showing the full face of the applicant), photocopy of relevant pages of the passport of the applicant which contain his/her photograph, all other particulars & photocopy of the pages of passport containing the valid visa. These photo-copies should be duly self-attested.Applications without the attested photo-copies of these documents will be liable to be summarily rejected.

(b) For application submitted in person before the ERO, the original passport should be produced for verification. Copies of relevant pages of passport would be kept by the ERO who would return the passport to the applicant.

To improve the enrolment of NRIs, form 6A may also be received directly by the NRIs through their relatives in India with name of assembly constituency and postal address of the ERO given on the form. In such cases, the applicant may fill up the form and send it back with documents mentioned at(a) above. In certain cases, the ERO may also verify the documents submitted by the NRIs through the Indian Embassy/High Commission where the applicant NRI is resident.

After the enrolment, the voter will be able to cast vote in election in the constituency, if he/she is physically present in the polling station along with original passport on the day of poll.

Names of overseas electors are included in the relevant part of the electoral roll of the constituency where his place of residence in India as mentioned in his passport is located. Within the relevant part, a separate section for "Overseas Electors" is created in the roll and names of overseas electors are kept in this section.

For more details and clarifications, may please refer to the link below.

Election Commission of India- Information regarding Overseas Electors

http://ecisveep.nic.in/voters/overseas-voters/