According to the Election Commission statistics, as many as one lakh NRI voters have registered themselves ahead of 2019 elections. These voters are drawn from different states. Of them, only 25,606 have voted. A majority of them are from Kerala. In fact, 25091 of these are from Kerala. In Delhi, as many as 336 NRI voters got enrolled, but not one of them voted. In West Bengal and Puducherry too, the situation is the same. As many as 272 NRI got themselves registered as voters in Puducherry and as many as 34 got enrolled in West Bengal. But, not one of them voted.
According to the External Affairs Ministry, as many as 3.10 crore Indians are living abroad and the Government has provided them with a facility to vote through proxies. A bill to this effect has been introduced in Parliament. Yet, the response has been extremely lukewarm. Only in politically volatile and educationally aware Kerala, the NRIs seem to be interested in politics.