theleaflet

Why Integrity of Election Commission is Critical to Save the Constitution and Democracy in India

THE FRAMERS OF THE constitution recognised the paramount significance of free and fair elections for sustaining democracy and seeking mandate of people for governance of India. Now wonder that much later the conduct of free and fair elections was recognised as the basic structure of the Constitution. The members of the Constituent Assembly were acutely conscious of the possibility that the government of the day might influence the electoral process to secure its own political and partisan interests. Consequently, the Constituent Assembly sought to separate the functions of political governance and electoral administration. This marked a departure from the framework under the Government of India Act, 1935, which did not envisage an independent, all-India constitutional body to supervise elections. ECI and Legislative Intent of Constituent Assembly Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, during the debate on Article 289 of the draft Constitution (now Article 324) on 15 June 1949, observed: In the interests of purity and freedom of elections to the legislative bodies, it was of the utmost importance that they should be freed from any kind of interference from the executive of the day. Although the Assembly eventually decided not to place the provision concerning elections in the Fundamental Rights Chapter, there was little disagreement about the underlying and paramount principle: the conduct of elections had to be insulated from executive interference. The Assembly aspired to establish an impartial institution that would inspire confidence across political parties and communities. However, these aspirations were accompanied by apprehensions about how such independence could be secured in practice. Article 289 contemplated that the President would appoint the Chief Election Commissioner and such other Election Commissioners as might be considered necessary. Members, however, questioned whether presidential appointment would genuinely guarantee independence because the President as per constitutional mandate would act on the advice of the Council of Ministers, headed by the Prime Minister. Prof. Shibban Lal Saxena, seeking to address this concern, suggested that appointments of the Election Commissioners be approved by a two-thirds majority in a joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament. Such a requirement, he argued, would foster cross-party consensus and prevent a single ruling party from imposing its preferred candidate. He also raised a second concern: since Article 289 did not prescribe qualifications for appointment as Chief Election Commissioner or Election Commissioner, there was no constitutional assurance that the appointee would possess the necessary competence, independence or integrity. Ambedkar himself cautioned: There is no use making the tenure of the Election Commissioner a fixed and secure tenure if there is no provision in the Constitution to prevent either a fool or a knave or a person who is likely to be under the thumb of the Executive. Pandit Hriday Nath Kunzru echoed these concerns and proposed that Parliament regulate appointments through legislation. Ultimately, on 16 June 1949, the Assembly adopted Article 289 with amendments. It became Article 324 of the Constitution, vesting the superintendence, direction and control of elections in the Election Commission. The debates reveal that the framers were concerned not merely with the existence of an Election Commission, but with the conditions necessary to make it genuinely independent. Golden Jubilee of ECI Celebrated its High Credibility The Election Commission of India (ECI) was established on 25 January 1950, a day before the Constitution came into force. Over the decades, it acquired a reputation as an institution capable of conducting elections on an extraordinary scale and, for much of its history, commanding public confidence. At the Golden Jubilee celebrations of the ECI on January 17, 2001 , former President K.R. Narayanan ( http://www.krnarayanan.in/html/speeches/others/jan17_01.htm ) acknowledged the institutions phenomenal contributions to Indian democracy. He commended the fact that both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition were present to pay tribute to the Commission, observing that their presence itself demonstrated the honoured position it occupied in Indias political structure. For that moment, they were in spite of being political adversaries had a shared vision of ECI as an independent institution meant to serve democracy on a bipartisan basis. SIR and Questions raised on Integrity of ECI Twenty-five years later, the picture is considerably different. ECI, once an institution that commanded respect and integrity, which had been the product of the careful craft and dogged determination of the Constituent Assembly, faces questions about its impartiality. Streets across India have witnessed protests by opposition groups, student organisations and civil society members against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and the conduct of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar. A central concern surrounding the SIR exercise has been the possibility that genuine voters could be removed from electoral rolls, resulting in mass disenfranchisement. Critics have particularly raised concerns about the alleged misuse of Form 7 to object to existing voter registrations, with women and minority communities among those said to be disproportionately affected. A report published by The Indian Express on 23 September 2026 (https://indianexpress.com/article/express-exclusive/election-commission-sir-14-objections-gyanesh-kumar-sukhbir-singh-sandhu-vivek-joshi-10889737/ )brought these concerns into sharper focus by documenting objections reportedly raised by the other two Election Commissioners to the manner in which CEC Kumar had handled aspects of the SIR process. These included unauthorized changes to Form 6, the centralisation of access to the voter database and the exclusion of other Commissioners from important decisions. The report has raised questions not only about the conduct of the revision exercise, but also about transparency and decision-making within the Commission itself. Tracing Erosion of ECIs Credibility The erosion of public trust in the ECI, however, has been gradual; it has not emerged out of the blue. It can be traced, at least in part, to a series of controversies that have accumulated over the years. In 2017, the Commission came under scrutiny for announcing the Assembly election schedule for Himachal Pradesh without simultaneously announcing the dates for Gujarat, departing from the convention of announcing elections in the two states together. Critics questioned whether the delay could benefit the ruling party in Gujarat. In 2018, the ECI's recommendation to disqualify twenty Aam Aadmi Party MLAs for allegedly holding offices of profit was set aside by the Delhi High Court, which held that the process had violated the principles of natural justice because the MLAs had not been given an adequate opportunity of hearing. Thereafter, in the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, opposition parties raised allegations of EVM manipulation, while civil society groups expressed concern that the ECI was not adequately responding to public queries and suggestions. The Commission was also accused of selectively addressing violations of the Model Code of Conduct, particularly after it gave clean chits to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah despite the dissenting opinions of Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa, which were not reflected in the final orders. Concerns over transparency also arose from alleged discrepancies between votes polled and votes counted, with the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and Common Cause approaching the Supreme Court in 2019 and ADR raising similar concerns after the 2024 elections. Further, the ECI was accused of favouring BJP-aligned factions in disputes over party names and election symbols, particularly following the splits in the Shiv Sena and the Nationalist Congress Party, by relying on legislative strength disregarding the extent of support such splits received at wider levels of organisations. Collectively, these controversies have raised questions about the Commissions neutrality, accountability and credibility as an independent constitutional body. The SIR controversy is perhaps the most serious flashpoint in this gradual erosion of trust. There is a peculiar irony in the protests against the SIR of electoral rolls: one of the most visible large-scale mobilisations in independent India explicitly centred on protecting the very right to vote that the Constitution had made a foundational premise of Indian democracy. When the Constituent Assembly adopted universal adult franchise, it made a remarkably ambitious choice: political participation would not be conditional upon property ownership, education, wealth or social standing. Unlike the early United States, where voting qualifications in several states restricted the franchise to men meeting property or tax-paying requirements, India began its constitutional life by recognising the political equality of its adult citizens. The Assemblys confidence in universal suffrage was, in itself, an extraordinary act of faith in ordinary Indians. Agitations Defending Right To Vote Yet, decades later, Rahul Gandhis Voter Adhikar Yatra through Bihar in AugustSeptember 2025, protesting the alleged disenfranchisement of eligible voters through SIR, brought people onto the streets to defend a right that was supposed to be secure for every adult citizen. This irony is also a reminder that the right to vote is the means through which citizens exercise control over the institutions that determine their access to education, healthcare, employment, welfare and justice and not only an isolated political entitlement. When a person loses their political voice, they also risk losing an important means of demanding these other rights. Martin Luther Kings Straggle for Right to Vote Martin Luther King Jr., in his 1957 address Give Us the Ballot , captured this interdependence when he declared: Give us the ballot, and we will no longer have to worry the federal government about our basic rights. The SIR protests, therefore, concern the preservation of political equality and the ability of ordinary citizens to hold the State accountable. There is something deeply unsettling about having to take to the streets to demand the protection of a right that the framers had entrusted to every adult citizen. The Issue of Right to Protest The Central Government and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party have accused protesters, primarily those mobilising under the banner of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and supported by opposition parties such as the Congress, of engaging in political agitation and violence rather than seeking genuine grievance redressal. However, it is important to recognise that protests demanding an impartial and accountable Election Commission are not necessarily expressions of hostility towards the constitutional establishment. They can, instead, be expressions of faith in the Constitution itself. To question an institution's functioning is not necessarily to reject its legitimacy; it may be to insist that the institution live up to the constitutional purpose for which it was created. The Supreme Court recognised this democratic significance of protest in Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan v. Union of India (2018). While considering restrictions on demonstrations at Jantar Mantar, the Court recognised that peaceful demonstrations through which citizens air their grievances and ensure that these grievances reach the relevant authorities are protected under Articles 19(1)(a) and 19(1)(b) of the Constitution. Importantly, the Court described legitimate dissent as a distinguishing feature of democracy. It also recognised that the right to protest must be balanced against the rights of other citizens and the requirements of public order. There is, therefore, a fundamental difference between challenging the legitimacy of constitutional democracy and demanding that constitutional institutions fulfil their responsibilities. Peaceful protest, when directed towards restoring the integrity of those institutions, can be an exercise in constitutional faith rather than constitutional defiance. Significance of Peoples Struggle for Right to Vote As mentioned earlier President Narayanan while inaugurating the golden jubilee celebrations of the Election Commission of India in 2001 observed that elections had aroused the hopes and aspirations of the unempowered sections of society. He was speaking of the extraordinary promise of universal adult suffrage: the promise that every citizen, irrespective of their social or economic position, would have a voice in the making of the Republic. Perhaps the people taking to the streets today are seeking to preserve and defend precisely that promise. The framers placed their faith in the people by entrusting every adult citizen with the vote; the people, in turn, are asking the institutions created by those framers to remain worthy of that faith. Framers of our Constitution trusted every adult citizen with the power to give shape to our democracy and fashion the destiny of our country. The leaders of the political regime at the centre operating the apparatus of the Indian State must also have the humility to listen when those very citizens take to the streets to defend the ECIs integrity which has been tragically has been eroding.