Constitutional and statutory bodies in India have similar work cultures. Based on my experience, I can say that too much has been made of divergent views expressed by members of the ECI. All constitutional authorities encourage officers at all levels to express their views freely and frankly.
Those who are protesting against the Election Commission of India (ECI)’s special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls forget an important rule we learnt in our school days. Never discredit your umpires and examiners, except when you have incontrovertible evidence. Without it, you will only end up being branded as a sore loser and losing all credibility.
Recent events will eventually bear this out. An Indian Express report of 23 September on the ongoing SIR made waves. It substantially strengthened the Opposition’s vicious attacks against the ECI when it suggested inter alia that this constitutional body was a divided house and that the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) himself—designed to be only first among equals—was arbitrarily over-ruling other Election Commissioners (ECs). During the last ten months alone, it pointed out, the ECI had seen sharp differences of opinion amongst its members on fourteen issues on how the special intensive revision (SIR) of voter lists should be carried out.
Two Election Commissioners (ECs), according to the article, objected to additional information being ascertained through a modified version of Form 6, ironically approved by the Supreme Court itself. This form makes each new voter declare whether he or his father or grandfather figured in the voter list of 2002, when the last SIR was carried out. Objections were also raised on the functioning of ECI-net, the computer software system that purportedly centralised the power to add or delete voters with the body’s DG (Systems) rather than leaving it to duly empowered local electoral registration officers. As a result, the latter could not temporarily add the names of 97 eligible persons in Goa to the voter rolls. Such disempowerment of local officers was later brought to the notice of the Cabinet Secretary, when in actual fact, the latter has no role to play in the functioning of the Commission. Later the Commission confirmed that this piece of information was totally incorrect.
Curiously, however, another report in the same paper of 26 September virtually performed a volte face. It pointed out that differences of opinion amongst the members of the Commission were routine and cited many such clashes in the past. What then remains of the original charge-sheet in the face of this subsequent retraction? Can then the Commission or its head be accused of any wrongdoing or misconduct? It does not seem so.
Constitutional and statutory bodies in India have similar work cultures. I have worked in two such organisations for a little less than a third of my career. In my younger days, I was Under Secretary and Deputy Secretary in the UPSC, and much later, Additional Secretary in the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC). Like many of my colleagues from different Services, I have also reported to the CEC as an observer for various parliamentary elections. Based on my experience, I can say that too much has been made of divergent views expressed by members of the ECI from time to time. All constitutional authorities encourage officers at all levels to express their views freely and frankly. What matters much more than such views, penned during the course of deliberations, is the final outcome. In the Commission’s own words, all final decisions on the SIR in the past one year have been unanimous.
Also, in accordance with its policy of maintaining the purity of electoral rolls, the Commission has tried to rectify errors of both wrongful inclusion as well as exclusion. SIR is nothing new; it is 74 years old. As a result of the latest exercise, the names of 13.21 crore persons who were not apparently bonafide voters had to be removed: 9.5 crores because they were not found at their place of residence or had permanently shifted; 1.01crores because they reflected duplicate entries in the electoral rolls and 2.7 crores because they were deceased. On the other hand, about 1.4 crore persons have been added so far (net figure added in phases 1 and 2) because on verification they were found to be genuine voters. Can it be anyone’s case that ineligible persons should be included in the voter list and eligible persons should be excluded? If errors still exist they can always be corrected, either through administrative or judicial intervention. As it is, the ECI has, as in the past, recently launched a special drive to include names of persons who were earlier excluded. There is always room for improvement, but it would be highly unjust and improper to cast aspersions on the Commission or its head just for carrying out their duties.
Preparing electoral rolls and conducting elections in a vast, diverse country with an electorate of about 100-crore voters in the world’s largest democracy is a daunting and complex task. That the ECI has over the generations performed its functions honestly and effectively is borne out by its own stellar record and the generous international praise that it has received—most recently from one of India’s most hostile critics, President Trump himself.
- Hardayal Singh was Additional Secretary CVC and is the author of the Moral Compass: Finding Balance and Purpose in an Imperfect World, Harper Collins India, 2022.
