Mixed reactions emerge from Opposition parties on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s idea of conducting simultaneous polls for Assemblies and Parliament. While Telangana Rashtra Samiti supported the move in a letter to law Commission, the DMK and Aam Admi Party (AAP) opposed the move.
Telangana Chief Minister and TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao has expressed his support for simultaneous polls to the lok Sabha and state legislature in the country. “Many are of the belief that simultaneous polls to state Assemblies and Parliament is BJP agenda or (Prime Minister) Modi’s agenda.
But, the law Commission has initiated the process long back,” TRS MP from Karimnagar B Vinod Kumar told media in New Delhi, after submitting Rao’s letter (in support of the proposal)to the law Commission Chairman on Sunday.
“Elected Prime Ministers have been spending their considerable time in campaigning for Assembly elections every year,” the TRS MP said pointing out as is evident from the fact that elections were held in different states in 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 after the elections to lok Sabha and some States in 2014.
“Telangana Rashtra Samithi party and KCR (as Rao is popularly known as) are of the opinion that polls at once would help development of States and the country. Our views (have been) told to the Chairman (before law Commission Chairman) clearly today,” Vinod said.
The Aam Aadmi Party firmly believes that simultaneous elections will “destroy” India’s parliamentary democracy and federalism, its senior leader Ashish Khetan said. Khetan, who met the chairman of the law Commission and its members, said AAP will submit a detailed paper to the commission outlining the party's position on the matter.
The law Commission had on June 14 written to all recognised political parties seeking their views on the issue. “Met law Commission Chairman & Members. Told them that AAP firmly believes that simultaneous elections will destroy our parliamentary democracy & federalism & it will mean mutilating the basic structure of our Constitution. We will soon submit a detailed paper before the Comm (sic),” he tweeted.
The Opposition DMK in Tamil Nadu firmly opposed the idea of simultaneous polls to the lok Sabha and State legislature, terming the law Commission’s proposal “a complete misadventure that will decimate the federal structure.”
DMK Working President MK Stalin said an earlier law Commission during the tenure of AB Vajpayee as Prime Minister in 1999 reported on the issue exhaustively.
“Where Parliament is skeptical whether this idea can be ever implemented this redundant exercise of producing a duplicative report that has no chances of being legislated appears questionable and if I may say, useless, both from legal and political standpoint,” Stalin said.
“On the contrary, there is a danger of diminishing the law Commission’s credibility,” he said in his representation submitted before law Commission Chairman, Justice B S Chauhan, in Delhi on Sunday, through DMK Rajya Sabha MP Tiruchy Siva.
The DMK was of “the firm opinion that the proposed call for simultaneous elections to lok Sabha and State legislatures goes against the basic tenets of our Constitution and established principles of democratic functioning,” he said.
Referring to the law Commission’s Working Paper dated April 17, 2018 on this subject, Stalin sought to point out various ‘discrepancies.’
“State legislatures have a distinct constitutional identity and derive their powers from Chapter III of the Constitution. Though Parliament is empowered to amend the Constitution - in accordance with Article 368 - there are basic features of the Constitution which cannot be abrogated,” he said.
On countries with simultaneous polls being cited as examples in this case, such as Sweden, Belgium and South Africa, Stalin said the population of Tamil Nadu alone outnumbered the combined population of the three countries. Any comparison of these countries with India in terms of population “is logically fallacious, completely misleading and unhelpful to the present discourse,” he added.