CHENNAI: In a significant step towards accessible elections, the department for welfare of differently-abled has introduced a voter signline to assist deaf voters on polling day. The service will be available on Thursday from 7am to 6pm via WhatsApp video call on 9498345350.
The initiative will enable communication between polling officials and hearing-impaired voters through sign language interpreters.
Activists said they had repeatedly urged the State Election Commission to provide sign language interpreters at state and district-level control rooms during the State Steering Committee on Accessible Elections (SSCAE) meeting.
While a few districts, including Vellore, had announced measures, they were not implemented uniformly. With this move, the differently-abled welfare department aims to bridge the gap and make the voting process more inclusive for deaf voters.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission has made Form 7A, containing the list of candidates in the same order as on Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), available in a screen reader-accessible format. Hosted on the Tamil Nadu CEO’s website, the form is presented as constituency-wise HTML tables that can be accessed using screen readers or text-to-speech (TTS), benefiting the majority of visually impaired voters who do not read Braille and can use computers.
While this format was introduced during the Lok Sabha elections, this is the first time it is being implemented for Assembly polls. Blind voters can visit the following link on any Internet-enabled device: https://erolls.tn.gov.in/acwithcandidate_tnla2026/AC_List.aspx to access it.
Voters can access it online, use the search bar to select their constituency and view details such as candidate serial number, name, party affiliation and symbol. By memorising the serial number, voters can independently identify and select their preferred candidate on the EVM using the embossed markings beside each button. The last button is reserved for NOTA. If there are more than 15 candidates, an additional balloting unit is attached, with a Braille sticker on the top indicating the machine number.
Talking about the initiative, Raghuraman Kalyanraman, a professor with visual impairment who helped test this facility, urged the election commission to provide the list in Tamil as well to reach more blind voters.
The Disability Rights Alliance also urged the Election Commission of India to encourage other states to adopt similar measures in the remaining phases of polling, so that visually impaired voters using screen readers can cast informed, independent and secret ballots.