Samikhsya Bureau
Amid widespread criticism from opposition parties that the Election Commission is working at the behest of ruling BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, election commissioner (EC) Ashok Lavasa reportedly skipped meetings on deciding violation of Model Code of Conduct, citing his ‘minority decisions going unrecorded’, sources said.
Reacting to the significant development ahead of the seventh and last phase of Lok Sabha elections, the Congress on Saturday charged the NDA government of muzzling institutions. On the other hand, chief election commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora termed the row erupting in media about internal functioning of poll panel as “unsavory and avoidable”.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) is a three-member full commission, comprising CEC Arora and two election commissioners, Lavasa and Sushil Chandra.
Lavasa had reportedly expressed his dissent over decisions to clear Modi and BJP president Amit Shah from charges of alleged MCC violation, in five different matters. On May 4, he reportedly wrote a letter to CEC Arora saying that his involvement in EC meetings had become meaningless as his minority decisions had gone unrecorded. “I am being forced to stay away from the meetings of the full commission since minority decisions are not being recorded….I might consider taking recourse to other measures aimed at restoring the lawful functioning of the Commission in terms of recording minority decisions. My various notes on the need for transparency in the recording and disclosure of all decisions, including the minority view, have gone unheeded, forcing me to withdraw from participating in the deliberations on the complaints,” Lavasa said in the letter.
He added that he would attend further meeting only after the poll panel started including dissent notes and minority decisions in its orders, the sources said.
The Congress, which has all along alleged the poll body to be biased, termed the episode as a “daylight murder of the Constitutional norms, set convention and propriety”.
Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said: “The poll panel’s rules express preference for a unanimous view, but provide for a majority ruling in the absence of unanimity. Being a constitutional body, the minority view has to be recorded, but this is being trampled to protect Modi-Shah duo. The Congress party had filed at least 11 complaints to the EC about brazen violation of Model Code of Conduct by PM Modi and BJP President, Amit Shah which were thrown in the dustbin.”
Surjewala added that PM Modi had taken upon himself the task of denigrating, damaging, decimating, dislodging and diminishing, the sanctity of every Institution of India.
However, CEC Arora said that diversion of views within the commission should remain within the confines of the Election Commission of India. It is learned that CEC Arora met Lavasa after receiving the latter’s letter.
Issuing a statement on Lavasa’s purported letter to Arora, the office of CEC said the three members of the Election Commission are not expected to be template or clones of each other, there have been so many times in the past when there has been a vast diversion of views as it can, and should be. “But the same largely remained within confines of ECI after demission of office unless appearing much later in a book written by the concerned ECs/CECs. I have personally never shied away from a public debate whenever required but there is time for everything,” the statement said.
The ECI statement further added: “It needs to be clarified categorically and unambiguously that this is purely an internal matter of ECI and as such any speculation,innuendoes and insinuations in this regard should be eschewed. It also needs to be mentioned that a meeting had already been scheduled on May 21 to discuss this (Lavasa issue) and related matters.”
