NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice on a plea seeking chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s suspension over decisions taken by the poll body on the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.A bench led by CJI Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana issued notice to the Election Commission of India, CEC and the other two election commissioners on the allegations made in the plea, which challenged the manner in which the ECI is functioning, alleging that powers vested in the poll panel as a multi-member constitutional body are being exercised without following the collective decision-making mechanism mandated by law.The plea came against the backdrop of an Indian Express report that claimed that two election commissioners objected on record at least 14 times over the past 10 months to decisions and orders on SIR that they said were issued without their knowledge or recommendation.
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What the top court said
- Justice Suryakant said that any modification of Form 6 – the application citizens use to register as new electors – had not been approved by the top court. “Any modified Form 6 has not been approved by us. Let’s be clear. When record is produced, we would like to see who has modified. But, your prayers appear jumbled up,” the CJI said.
- The top court said that the transaction of business within the poll panel “has to be unanimous” and if it finds that certain decisions were taken by CEC without the required unanimity, it could reconsider or recall those decisions. “They are expected to take unanimous decisions. If there is no unanimity, it has to be by majority. If records show some decision was not unanimous, etc., we will injunct those decisions and say they are ultra vires. Can we ex parte come to a decision that all decisions were unilateral? We expect them to respond in a clear, transparent manner.”
- “Let’s first have authenticated information on that. We can always annul any decision,” the bench added.
- “We presume that decisions are taken by Election Commission as per law,” the court said.
What is the controversy
A report by the Indian Express claimed that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had formally objected at least 14 times over the past 10 months to decisions and orders related to the SIR, alleging that some were issued without their knowledge or recommendation.The report said the poll panel’s software added a requirement for ancestral details and a link to the previous SIR in Form 6, the voter registration form, without the legal amendment required under election rules. It claimed the two commissioners objected to the change.In Goa, the report alleged that the EC’s software did not have a feature to restore 97 eligible voters despite directions to verify and restore their names. In West Bengal, it claimed that more than 16.10 lakh appeals were filed in the EC’s name against voters whose names had been restored by judicial officers, without the knowledge or approval of the two commissioners or the state’s chief electoral officer.The Election Commission has said that differences of opinion are normal in institutional deliberations and maintained that all its orders are legally valid and follow the prescribed procedures.