The Registration of Electors (Special Provisions) Bill received Cabinet approval this week to be submitted to Parliament.
This would allow those who have suffered displacement due to the war to vote from their area of permanent residence prior to displacement.
The Bill submitted for Cabinet approval by Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe would seek to safeguard the voting rights of displaced families and individuals forced to flee from the Northern Province and have settled elsewhere in the country as a result.
In June 2013 too, the then Justice Minister Rauff Hakeem submitted and the Registration of Electors (Special Provisions) Bill got it passed with amendments.
The Bill at the time proposed to allow IDPs displaced from the North between May 1, 1983 and May 18, 2009 to register to vote if they haD not been registered as voters in any other electoral district.