The Election Commission of India has informed a parliamentary panel that it is not in favour of bringing down the minimum age limit for candidates to contest elections to the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha, legislative assemblies and state upper houses.
Officials of the Election Commission of India, who appeared before the Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice of Parliament on Monday, briefed the panel on the EC’s views on bringing parity between the voting age and the minimum age for contesting elections.
The Indian Express, citing sources, reported that the parliamentary panel had asked if the minimum age for elections to the Lok Sabha and assemblies could be brought down from 25 to 21 and from 30 to 25 for the upper house bodies.
Responding to the suggestion, the EC officials said that it was in favour of maintaining the status quo on the issue, a stand it said was in line with the views of BR Ambedkar.
Stating that such suggestions were also put before the Constituent Assembly, the poll officials reminded the panel that Ambedkar had moved a resolution to insert a new article — currently Article 84 of the Constitution — to oppose any such move.
Ambedkar, according to EC officials, was of the view that only people with some degree of higher qualification and a certain amount of knowledge and practical experience in the affairs of the world should serve the Legislature.
The legislatures, the officials further said, have been entrusted with the most crucial and vital role of laying down policies and programmes and enacting laws for the country, and reiterated its stand against making changes to the current age limits for contesting elections, the IE report said.
Article 84 of the Constitution of India, 1949, lays down the minimum qualifications for the Members of Parliament. “A person shall not be qualified to be chosen to fill a seat in Parliament unless he…is, in the case of a seat in the Council of States, not less than thirty years of age and, in the case of a seat in the House of the People, not less than twenty five years of age,” it states.