On Sunday, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh reminded his country's 10 million non-resident citizens that they can vote in elections under a law passed in 2010.
But it's far from clear whether many overseas Indians will bother to exercise their franchise as five Indian states get ready to go to the polls starting later this month. The Times of India reported on Monday that just one non-resident citizen - a man living in Oman - voted in last year's state elections.
While Mr. Singh's remarks could encourage a few more people to register to vote for the upcoming elections, many Indians living abroad are likely to find the process too cumbersome.
According to the Election Commission, overseas Indians wishing to register to vote have to fill out a form, have it certified by an Indian foreign service officer in the country where they live, and send the form and other documents to the voter registration offices closest to their official residence in India. Moreover, to actually vote, these overseas citizens must then return to that place of residence, in India and go to the polls personally. Only a few government employees are allowed to cast absentee ballots.
It is unlikely that many natives of Kerala working on construction sites in the Middle East or Punjabi taxi drivers in New York could afford to leave their jobs and come to India just to vote. Richer Indian immigrants like software programmers, doctors and corporate executives would find it easier to afford a trip home, but are probably even less likely to do so given that voter turnout is generally poor among the middle and upper classes even within India.
Leaving aside voting rights for overseas Indians, much needs to be done to make it easier for the far larger group of Indians who migrate from one state to another to exercise their democratic franchise. There are about 100 million temporary domestic migrants in India, according to one study.
During the 2009 national election, I met a small group of college students from Orissa who were in Mumbai for internships. On voting day in south Mumbai they were walking near Churchgate station whiling away the holiday afternoon when I approached them to ask whether they had voted and for whom.
All said they had not voted, because there was no way for them to submit an absentee ballot either from Mumbai or the city where their college was located. They would have to return to their home towns, which was too expensive. Moreover, they did not think that they could the time off from their internships - or their classes had they been in session then - to make that journey during the election.
The Indian Election Commission says that members of the armed forces, those on election duty and a handful of other migrants can vote by mail or through a proxy, but the service is not available to the vast majority of people who move for economic reasons like farm workers who move from Bihar to Punjab or taxi drivers from Uttar Pradesh who ply the roads of Mumbai.
Those who move within the country, of course, can register in the city to which they have moved. But to do so they must show an official proof of residence in their new city, which many Indians, especially poor migrants, are not able to because they have no property or lease in their name.
For many Indian migrants, international and domestic, voting will probably remain a distant dream, at least for the time being.