The most amazing story of evolution of human society relates todeveloping democracy which has primacy over the rest of human activity. From Tilak to Gandhiji and thousands other freedom fighters toiled hard to make India a free nation and provided citizens freedom and dignity of life. The founding fathers of the Constitution, provided many constitutional institutions to secure democratic system. One such institution is the Election Commission which is mandated by the Constitution for superintendence and control of election process to ensure purity and fair play for facilitating the citizens to elect representatives of their choice to the legislatures. Thus the Election Commissioner plays role of a guardian of the election process in the entire country in terms of Article 324 of the Constitution.
While debating on the corresponding Article 289 in the Constituent Assembly on June 16, 1949 several member including RK Sidhva pleaded about the role of the election machinery “Quite independent, free from any influence from any agency, Executive or anybody”. Another member Hriday Nath Kunjuru had apprehended on placing a great deal of power in the hands of the President, which may provide room for exercise of political influence “in the appointment of CEC and the other election commissioners”. He had urged the need of entrusting the election process to people who must be free from political bias. In reply to the debate on the issues Dr Ambedkar had explained that “the House will see that so far as the removal of the members of the Election Commission is concerned the Chief Election Commissioner is placed on the same footing as the Judges of the Supreme Court”. He at one stage of the debate had even mentioned on putting an instrument to facilitate mandatory consultation by the President to make the process of appointment fair. However, he dropped the idea to leave the matter to the wisdom of the President. Thus the founding fathers of the Constitution had conceived the CEC as a robust independent institution to remain free from any suspicion, bias or partisanship.
In reality working of the Election Commission and appointment to it has been drawing criticism from political parties for last four decades. Political parties have shown inconsistent stand in the matter. Every party while in opposition takes the stand for making the process free from any flaw but forgets the same pledges once voted to power. Loknayak Jayaprakash once had said that “Those who are in power want to take full advantage of the existing state of affairs and have no interest in getting it changed”. It may be mentioned that the Unified Janta Party which consisted Bharatiya Jansangha (The earlier incarnation of the BJP), in their 1977 manifesto had assured to “introduce electoral reforms after a careful consideration of suggestions made by various committees including the Tarkunde Committee.
Hence the citizens, Constitution experts, social activists as well as former members of the Election Commission and political parties havebeen demanding for reform to strengthen independence of the office of the CEC which continues till date. To strengthen credibility of the Election Commission, its appointment process needs a fresh look, as successive Union Governments have used the process to instal weak pliable officers to handle election process. Accordingly, the appointment process needs to be transparent and must involve both ruling and opposition parties as well as civil society to ensure its credibility.
The stance of the Government of India always has been that the Executive has an absolute authority to nominate the CEC and other members. But this is contrary to the vision that guided founding fathers of the Constitution and the belief and trust they left behind. It is time to bring necessary reforms to inject purity to the election process.
The callousness of the successive Union Governments to strengthen independence of the EC could be understood from the fact that the 20 reform proposals mooted by the EC is pending since long. Several retired CECs including SY Quraishi have in past demanded for strengthening independence of the Election Commission. Citing 1990 recommendations of Dinesh Goswami Committee Justice Venkat Challiah Commission, Nabin Chawla, a former CEC in a recent article had asserted the need of a collegiums like body consisting of the Chief Justice of the SC and the Leader of Opposition to handle appointment of the CEC and other members to the EC to build it a “robust” institution. Besides an editorial of an English saily has emphatically urged the Government to set aside blame game and work to improve credibility of the institution. In view of the past experience, the Government may not do much to bring reform in the appointment process for which the last hope may be the Judiciary. The pertinent point is that if removal of the CEC is placed on the “same footing as the Judges of the Supreme Court” why not similar collegium for his appointment be followed also.
(The writer is a former Deputy Speaker, Odisha Assembly,
Phone: 9437412877. Views expressed are personal)