Mamata Banerjee ought to exercise restraint
It is unfortunate that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee should have challenged the Election Commission of India to do its worst. As a person holding a constitutional post, she ought to have been restrained. Banerjee’s anger stemmed from the poll panel issuing her a show-cause notice over her promise in the midst of the Assembly election to create a new Asansol district. Instead of responding to the notice in a sober manner, the Chief Minister dared the Election Commission, said she would repeat her remark “a thousand times”, and went on to cast aspersions on the impartiality of the independent body. Banerjee is an experienced politician who should know that making promises of the kind she did when voting has begun, violates the election Model Code of Conduct. Yet, even after the mistake, she could have simply expressed regret and promised to not repeat it. Banerjee has been seething with anger against the poll panel for a while now. She is upset that a senior police officer (Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar) was moved out at the Election Commission’s directive because opposition parties had questioned his impartiality. She also appears to be angry over the panel’s advice that “urgent legal action” must be taken against a senior Trinamool Congress leader over reports that he had threatened the polling agents of rival political parties. The Chief Minister is upset that the left has been targeting the State electoral officers for being biased in the State Government’s favour. Finally, Banerjee has taken a dim view of the visit of a full bench of the Election Commission of India to West Bengal in the wake of increasing reports of election-related violence in the State. Banerjee has the image of a street-fighter and a doughty politician, but these qualities should be directed against her political opponents and not the Election Commission of India. The more she provokes the poll panel to act against her, the more it will appear that she and her party have things to hide.
To be fair, Mamata Banerjee is not the first politician to challenge the Election Commission; others from different political parties have done it on various occasions when they felt the heat, and got away. There is no reason to believe that the West Bengal Chief Minister will not as well — perhaps with a few reprimands. While the Election Commission of India has many powers, it is rare for it to move decisively as to truly punish the violators of the code of conduct. The panel has to walk a thin line: Keep violations in check while also give the space that parties and politicians need in a democratically-held election. Politicians must keep in mind that global credibility and acceptability of India’s electoral process rests on the free and fair nature of elections; a process which seeks to provide a level-playing field to all stakeholders in the fray. Both the Election Commission of India and political parties have to work in tandem to preserve this reputation.