Dismiss debate on EC functioning as ‘hoo-haa', then hail India as ‘robust democracy'

The Print

21 hours ago

The EC is meant to be an autonomous constitutional body. In June 1949, the Constituent Assembly deliberated on its role and the need to keep it outside the executive's purview. It appointed a committee to deal with what were called Fundamental Rights. That committee recommended that elections to the legislature be regarded as a fundamental right and treated accordingly.
Dismissing the intense public debate on the independence and functioning of the EC as 'hoo-ha', while simultaneously hailing India as a 'robust democracy,' reflects a clear ignorance of the very definition of democracy and the critical role the EC plays in preserving and sustaining it.
Retired entrepreneur Jaithirth Rao concluded his treatise on the Election Commission of India thus: 'The hoo-ha about the Election Commission, about electoral rolls, and about EVMs suggests that irksome comic relief remains a part of the loud debates of our robust democracy. Perhaps we can also try to find other topics for loud debates.'
The House, while recognising the fundamental importance of elections, wanted them to be provided for in another part of the Constitution rather than in the chapter dealing with Fundamental Rights. It affirmed—without any dissent—that in the interest of the purity and freedom of elections to legislative bodies, it was of the utmost importance to free them from any interference by the executive of the day.
Accordingly, elections were removed from the category of Fundamental Rights and placed in a separate part containing Article 289, which transferred the superintendence, direction, and control of the preparation of electoral rolls and of all elections to Parliament and the state legislatures to a body outside the executive, to be called the Election Commission. In the final draft of the Constitution, this provision became Article 324.
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Making the EC subservient to the Centre
The Supreme Court drew on these deliberations while delivering its judgment in W.P. (Civil) No. 104 of 2015 on 2 March 2023:
'Keeping in view the importance of maintaining the neutrality and independence of the office of the Election Commission to hold free and fair election which is a sine qua non for upholding the democracy as enshrined in our Constitution, it becomes imperative to shield the appointment of Election Commissioners and to be insulated from the executive interference.
'We declare that the appointment of the Chief Election Commissioner and the Election Commissioners shall be made on the recommendations made by a three-member Committee comprising of the Prime Minister, Leader of the Opposition of the Lok Sabha and in case no Leader of Opposition is available, the Leader of the largest opposition party in the Lok Sabha in terms of numerical strength and the Chief Justice of India…'
The Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023 does the very opposite, making the EC subservient to the whims of the Prime Minister and Home Minister of the day, thereby endangering the very purpose for which the Commission was constituted.
The results are clear: the EC has virtually become an extension of the North and South Block on Delhi's Raisina Hill. This bids farewell to free and fair elections in the 'world's largest democracy.'
Evidence of this erosion came in the form of a letter to the EC by the Constitutional Conduct Group (CCG) of former senior civil servants on 11 April 2024:
'The ECI has made no efforts to assuage doubts in the minds of the thinking public and political parties about the integrity of EVMs and the need to use VVPATs effectively to ensure accuracy in the recording of votes. Nor has the ECI been particularly effective in enforcing the Model Code of Conduct to check its misuse, especially by the party in power… In the current elections as well, infractions of the Model Code of Conduct by no less a personage than the Prime Minister have not been acted upon by the ECI even after these were brought to its notice… In spite of the enormous powers vested in it under Article 324 of the Constitution of India, the ECI, in recent years, has exhibited a strange diffidence, especially in dealing with actions that impact the conduct of free and fair elections.'
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The shadow of doubt over 2024 elections
Such an indictment by a group of former officials—who have direct knowledge and experience in conducting, monitoring, and supervising elections over the years—clearly indicates the decay and degeneration that has set into the EC. And this is not without reason.
In August 2024, the Independent Panel for Monitoring Indian Elections (IPMIE) summed up the conduct and integrity of the 2024 parliamentary election thus:
1. Electoral procedure and alleged infractions in vote counting: The absence of adequate cross-verification between EVMs and VVPATs—the insistence on non-counting of VVPATs by design—may have facilitated large-scale, spurious injections of votes during each of the seven phases of voting.
2. Voting registration and allegations of voter exclusion and suppression: State-led voter suppression measures were reported from Gujarat (where hundreds of Muslim fishermen were reportedly struck off from voter rolls), Uttar Pradesh (where dozens of voters in Muslim- concentration villages were reportedly physically assaulted and restrained from voting by policemen), Jammu & Kashmir (where policemen detained party workers and activists unlawfully) and Assam, where around 100,000 residents had in the past been designated as 'doubtful voters' by the ECI.
3. Party financing and abuse of state agencies to deny level playing field: Data relating to electoral bonds appeared to confirm the ruling party's near-monopoly over political financing.
4. Sectarian rhetoric and media coverage: Throughout the election period, the BJP, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, engaged in sectarian rhetoric on a hitherto unprecedented scale. At least 287 instances of hate speeches (including 61 by Modi) have been documented. The BJP's core narrative demonised Muslims (who were referred to as 'infiltrators' and 'jihadis', among other dehumanising terms).
5. Electoral authority: The ECI appeared largely to act like an arm of the government, refusing to take decisive action against violations of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) and of electoral laws by ruling party members. The ECI's conduct throughout the election process reflected a systematic abdication of its constitutional obligation to conduct free and fair elections. Efforts by opposition parties, election watch bodies and citizens groups to address the many concerns to EC, went unheeded.
6. Lack of electoral redress: The performance of India's higher judiciary, particularly the Supreme Court (SC), during the 2024 General Elections to remedy various electoral integrity related grievances was weak and inadequate.
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Undoing of India's electoral democracy
To make the EVM system auditable and voter-verifiable, the Supreme Court ordered the introduction of VVPATs in 2013. But in defiance of this order, in February 2018 Chief Election Commissioner OP Rawat directed state chief electoral officers to verify VVPAT slips in only one randomly selected polling station per assembly constituency. This pathetically low 0.3 per cent sample size defeated the very purpose of installing VVPATs in all EVMs — tantamount to non-implementation of the Supreme Court's order. Through bluff, bluster, and false affidavits filed in the Supreme Court, the EC has reduced VVPATs to meaningless bioscopes.
Experts say this deliberate denial of verifiability and auditability has facilitated the spurious injection of votes in various constituencies by inflating vote percentages across multiple polling phases. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, as well as in the Haryana and Maharashtra assembly polls, there were astounding mismatches or spikes — ranging from 7 per cent to 12 per cent — between the number of votes recorded immediately after polling and the figures released before counting. These anomalies, now the subject of raging controversy, have been compounded by the EC's failure to provide Form 17C—the ultimate proof of votes polled—to all candidates or their agents. This has triggered the suspicion of a 'stolen mandate'.
Adding to this is the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in Bihar, which looks like a 'panic attack' on the EC that bypassed established training, drafting, and procedural safeguards. The electoral roll revision has no basis in law and was 'invented in haste' to pursue an agenda of disenfranchising millions of voters. The Supreme Court has observed that 'SIR of Bihar's electoral rolls is a contest between Article 324, which empowers the EC to control elections, and the constitutional right of adult suffrage enshrined in Article 326 of the Constitution.'
All of this reflects the arrogant and dismal functioning of the EC and its failure to ensure the integrity and fairness of elections, its raison d'être. By its commissions and omissions, the EC has landed itself in a whirlwind and is now facing an existential crisis. This could well be the undoing of India's electoral democracy.
M.G. Devasahayam is a retired IAS officer and chairman of People-First. He also served in the Indian Army. He is the author of Emergency and Neo-Emergency: Who will defend Democracy? Views are personal.
(Edited by Prashant)