ISLAMABAD: PILDAT chief Ahmad Bilal Mehboob has on Friday said that electronic voting and biometric system need around Rs 1 trillion for implementation. 

Talking to a Private news channel Ahmad Bilal Mehboob said that he didn't think that Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) was responsible for the delay in the implementation of biometric system or electronic voting, as alleged by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Mehboob said that the process is slow because the legislation started quite late and the political parties didn't display any will. He said that political will is vital in this regard.

"It needs electronic voting machines, biometric machines, training and infrastructure. And even if they do it, it can't be done in one election only. In India as well, it took around three or four elections to complete this process, and it is impossible here to do it in one too", he said.

The PILDAT chief told that the thumb impressions are very difficult to identify due to nature of their work.

"For example, labourers or farmers often have their thumb impressions almost deleted. ECP tried it in recent by-polls in Haripur but the attempt failed because about 40% of the impressions couldn't be verified", he said.

He added that in a recent conference in India he was told that the Indian election commission was also still thinking how it could ensure verification in postal ballots of overseas voters.

-APP