Selective reform

Election Commission has not addressed key weaknesses in SIR

The Election Commission of India (ECI) has provided unsatisfactory and suboptimal responses to recent revelations of serious shortcomings in its functioning, especially in conducting the Special Intensive Revision (SIR). Neither the Press Note issued by Nirvachan Sadan after The Indian Express investigative reports, nor the joint meeting of the three commissioners allayed public misgivings about the SIR process, which, it transpired, at least two commissioners had highlighted. The Press Note, defensive in tone, merely reiterated in varying phraseology that the EC acted in accordance with the laws. Specific responses to the objections raised by two commissioners at least 14 times over the past 10 months were notably missing. These differences were explained away as “suggestions” and “a normal part of deliberation in any institution”. The Press Note does not say why the “differing views and observations” were not resolved.

 

Several new decisions were announced, addressing some of the dissenting commissioners’ concerns. Agendas would be circulated before each EC meeting and minutes issued thereafter; officers’ foreign trips would need EC approval; new information-technology modules would be pre-inspected by a committee of officers prior to their being placed before the Commission; the ECINet software would be reviewed by a committee headed by a deputy election commissioner; and field officers would be given more flexibility. These announcements and the apparent show of EC solidarity were unconvincing. On the substantive issues that turned the SIR exercise into a nightmare for millions of potential voters, the ECI did not give convincing answers — for instance, the requirement in the online version of Form 6 to map a new voter to her parents or family member on the roll. The ECINet digital platform does not permit an applicant to proceed without filling in this information — leaving orphans or those whose parents died before the 2002 SIR with little recourse. Legal experts have asserted that the EC’s claim that the Supreme Court had approved this parent-mapping declaration in the online form, which was included in July this year, is incorrect; there is no specific adjudication on this point.

 

In August, one of the commissioners had described it as illegal. Nor has the ECI addressed the hot-button issue the dissenting commissioners had raised in the context of West Bengal, where a record number of voters were excluded from the electoral roll. Appeals against inclusion had been filed for a large number of voters under the SIR. The dissenting commissioners said neither they nor the state officials concerned had been informed about who had filed these appeals and on what basis. In short, the ECI still has a long way to go before public trust in its working can be restored. Tinkering with the process without addressing the deeper pathologies that have vitiated the functioning of an institution in which Indians always took great pride will no longer work. India’s democracy depends on its commitment to veracity and impartiality.