EC infighting going too far

The long-running battle between the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and the two commissioners over fresh voter list versus an updated electoral roll, has come to a head. The CEC has opted to go it alone with his decision for a new voters' list. To prepare this, he has apparently arranged with the ministries concerned to recruit 2.4 lakh enumerators, 70,000 supervisors, 6,235 assistant registration officers and 83 registration officers. Even a detailed schedule has been drawn up unilaterally for completion of recruitment by November, the incumbents' training by December and commencement of the voter-list preparation in January. In all of this, the two election commissioners were not consulted -- in any real sense. The CEC might like to argue that the election commissioners had been repeatedly issuing their note of dissent and since he had a timeframe to maintain, he could not wait indefinitely on the issue.

On a closer look, his argument does not stand to reason. It can be assailed by recourse to an honest evaluation of his approach in this particular case. First of all, he has not made any credible attempt to bridge the gaps between himself and the two election commissioners on the question of a new voter-list.

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As an experienced person in the legal world, he must be fully aware of the distinction between a commission (that too a statutory and a constitutional one) and a one-man authority. Above all, what appears to be an inexplicable folly on his part as the leader of the commission is his failure to convene a meeting of the commission for the last three and a half months. If held, the interaction would have helped iron out the internal differences. Or at least, the next course of action could be determined through a consensual approach which is regarded as indispensable for fostering public confidence in the Election Commission.

If the CEC embroils himself deeper into a controversy, the credibility of the whole election machinery will come under question.

That is the note of warning we would like to issue.