Empowering India: Lend a helping hand

Liberty Institute is looking for politically conscious citizens across India. We offer a way for meaningful participation in our democratic process.

Liberty Institute, New Delhi has launched EmpoweringIndia.org with the objective of empowering the citizens with information about their candidates and constituencies. The purpose is to help the citizen make informed choice about their candidates. Information is power, and empowered citizens are the foundation of effective democratic governance. Information is also key to making our democratic institutions transparent, and holding our elected representative accountable.  

Empowering India was selected for the 2009 Manthan Awards for South Asia in the e-governance category in December 2009.

At present, this site provides three levels of information –

Electoral information, Candidate information, Constituency development indicators. We hope to provide information about elected representatives, and their legislative performance, soon.

EmpoweringIndia seeks to provide a platform to voters

• To know about their candidates;
• To know about the developmental levels in their own constituency and district;
• To register comments on crucial issues affecting their constituency;
• To write to their elected representatives
• To use an informal dummy voting system, and indicate their preference for the candidate of their choice by casting an online vote!
• To assess the performance of their elected representatives;

Need Help

There are over 5000 parliamentary and assembly constituencies in the country. There are about 50,000 people who contest for these seats. To monitor all the candidates and constituencies, and to disseminate the information, we need an active network of citizens. There are three specific areas where local help is vital. One, we need to compile the personal data (assets, liabilities, criminal charges, if any) from the affidavits filed by the candidates which are often written in regional languages. Two, we need to configure the towns and villages that make up an electoral constituency, so that the constituency level developmental data could be compiled. Three, we need to disseminate the information among local voters, civil society organisations, and local media, so that the citizens may make an informed choice about their candidates.

So, we are looking for volunteers with regional language and computer skills, and also perhaps good internet access, to help digitise the data. We do offer a basic honorarium to the volunteers. Please visit our web sites for more information about the kind of information that we are compiling. The experience also helps one understand the electoral processes and democratic institutions of this the largest democracy in the world. If you find this interesting, and would like to be a part of a national network of politically conscious citizens contributing to strengthen India’s democratic institutions, please contact us at the address below.