In a major relief for smaller parties serious about electoral politics, the Election Commission has eased rules that govern the allotment of symbols for candidates to contest elections.A new amendment to these norms will allow nominees of registered unrecognised political parties (RUPPs) to contest on common symbols if the party in question has polled at least 1 percent of the total valid votes cast in one of the two previous elections it fought in a given state.The significant amendment to the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968, has been made in the middle of ongoing election cycles across five states and UT. The 1968 order lists concessions to parties to retain election symbols across general elections.The amendment, signed by EC Secretary Ashwani Kumar Mohal, comes into force with immediate effect. It is a departure from the earlier provision, according to which a party could avail of the concession for a third time only if it had contested the last two elections in the state on that common symbol and its candidates had also polled at least 1 per cent of valid votes cast in the last election.Now, the concession condition of “at least 1 per cent votes” has been extended to any of the two previous polls that the party had contested.The amendment in question specifically targets Paragraph Explanation (ii) to Paragraph 10(B) of the 1968 Order, which deals with the allotment of reserved symbols to parties that do not meet the criteria for recognised national or state party status.According to sources in the poll panel, the attempt has been made to encourage genuine parties, while weeding out non-serious outfits that register as parties, contest elections under protected symbols, but consistently fail to demonstrate any meaningful public support. Such parties often contest elections merely to retain their symbol status or for other extraneous reasons, diluting the democratic process.India has a plethora of unrecognised political parties, many of which contest elections with minimal voter connect. The new condition of a minimum one percent vote share threshold introduces a performance-based criterion for continued eligibility, nudging parties to build genuine ground support rather than relying on procedural concessions indefinitely.The amendment has been issued under the powers vested in the EC under Article 324 of the Constitution, read with Section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, Section 21 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, and Rules 5 and 10 of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961.Notably, the EC in 2025 delisted over 800 registered unrecognized political parties for not contesting polls for six consecutive years since 2019.