An all party meeting will be convened early next year to discuss electoral reforms, with special emphasis on ways to prevent criminals from contesting the election. Union Law and Justice Minister Salman Kurshid informed this at the All India Conference of Intellectuals in Bangalore on Friday.

He pointed out that paradigm shift in electoral process is the need of the day. He however cautioned that voters’ right to recall and reject should be carefully implemented as neighbours keen on destroying our sovereignty and integrity can misuse this right by terming rejected votes percentage, as a referendum against the Indian Union.

He propagated use of IT for making voters use internet to cast their vote. He suggested German and South African models to avoid influence of cast and community, money and muscle power on the voters.

He stressed on the need to avoid by-elections and introduction of EVM linked Verifiable paper trial machines to check voters’ fraud and malfunctions. He urged intellectuals to exercise their franchise so that the elected candidate can reflect their choice.