Congress' Venugopal slams formation of panel on 'One nation, One election'

The Congress alleged on Saturday that the high-level committee formed to make recommendations on "one nation, one election" is a systematic attempt to sabotage India's parliamentary democracy.

Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal said the non-inclusion of the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, in the panel and instead, having a former leader of opposition in it, is an insult to Parliament.

"We believe that the High Level Committee on simultaneous elections is nothing but a systematic attempt to sabotage India's parliamentary democracy," Venugopal said on X.

"In a shocking insult to Parliament, the BJP has appointed a former LOP to the committee instead of Rajya Sabha LOP Sh. Mallikarjun kharge ji," he added.

Venugopal said first the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) comes up with this "gimmick" to distract from the Adani "scam", unemployment, price rise and other pressing issues concerning people, then, to make matters worse, tries to tilt the "committee's balance by excluding fierce opponents".

"What is the reason behind Kharge ji's exclusion?" the Congress leader asked.

"Is a leader who has risen from such a humble background to the top post of India's oldest party, leading the entire opposition in the Upper House, an inconvenience for the BJP-RSS?" he asked.

The government notified the eight-member high-level committee on Saturday to examine and make recommendations at the earliest on the issue of holding simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha, state assemblies, municipalities and panchayats.

The committee will be headed by former president Ram Nath Kovind and will have Home Minister Amit Shah, Congress leader in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, former leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and former Finance Commission chairman N K Singh as members.