KCR rightly tears into an ineffectual EC

Emphasizing an imperative need for the unity of ‘Dil Wale and Dimakh Wale’, meaning the ‘large-hearted and intelligentsia,’ Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) president and Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao said such individuals should shoulder the responsibility in forming right and dynamic governments, benefiting the people at large. He further underscored need for such persons, who are capable to work for the welfare of people only, but not persons who simply carry with them, the name of their forefathers and ancestors (‘Namdaree Nahee, Kamdaree Hona Chahiye!’) but doing nothing.

KCR was addressing a gathering of prominent personalities, intellectuals, and political leaders etc., from Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, after joining in BRS on June 11, 2023 in Hyderabad. KCR had further chosen the occasion to launch a sharp and focused criticism on the functioning of Election Commission of India (ECI) which perennially failed and continue to fail to stop poll irregularities, misdeeds and false promises being made by some parties.

ECI also failed miserably in monitoring, controlling, and stopping some influential political forces in indulging unfair methods, resulting in adversely affecting the democratic fabric of the country, criticised KCR. He said that some political parties by provoking hatred and making false and irrational promises won elections by hook or crook and stay in power without fulfilling either none or many of the promises they made. KCR was obviously referring to Governments at the centre.

After inaugurating BRS Party Office, in Nagpur, on June 15, 2023, CM KCR reiterated that Indian democratic system had gone astray because of the vicious game winning being played by certain political forces, which were bent upon electoral victory at any cost even if it means undermining basic Electoral Norms. KCR’s criticism of ECI assumes significance with Telangana due for assembly elections later this year followed by Lok Sabha polls in early 2024.

ECI is a Constitutionally Guaranteed Independent Institution, came into effect from ‘day one’ of adopting Constitution on November 26, 1949. Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) was the sole member of ECI from 1950 to 1993 but later from October 1, 1993 it became a three-member body. Beginning with Sukumar Sen as the first CEC, to the present Rajiv Kumar several luminaries occupied the seat including the all-time great TN Seshan. In spite of the Constitutional safeguard that through a parliamentary impeachment alone CEC can be removed from office, ECI seldom functioned unbiased, barring in couple of instances!

ECI by and large limits itself to the responsibility of merely administering elections to Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha, State Legislative Assemblies, MLCs, and the offices of President and Vice-President in the country. This responsibility it shoulders only when it is mandatory or obligatory which takes place either once in five years or as and when elections are caused for various reasons ahead of the mandated term. ECI rarely functions with authority and responsiveness when there is no election and literally sleeps throughout between election and election and does not bother about ingenuine approaches of some political parties.

In the absence of proper check from ECI, people have no option except to become victim to false promises. ECI should check and view any such false promise seriously and if necessary, warn those who make, of serious consequences, including withdrawing party registration, if they have no basis to substantiate. In India, mesmerising the public with false and impracticable promises is taken for granted. Even during the campaign while the lengthy election process is on, ECI maintains stoic silence in preventing political parties indulging in false promises. This may lead to an unfortunate situation, wherein a dishonest and unprincipled party could come to power.

The ECI’s Model Code of Conduct (MCC) that has no statutory basis but only a persuasive effect regarding misuse of official machinery is a big joke and remained as a mere formality or at best to harass parties that are against the government in power at the centre. The Commission sticks to rule book only in the case of candidates’ Model Code, expenses, affidavits, offensive speeches etc, during election process.

After a particular party is voted to power, opposition parties start making false promises as in Telangana, until the next elections, aiming at undermining the government and confusing the public. There is no check on this.

Many a time, many political parties, in their election manifestoes make tall promises, which are not Specific, not Measurable, not Achievable, not Realistic and no mention of Time frame.

To put it in positive words, the election manifesto shall necessarily be a SMART one. It is unfortunate that, the ECI, is not in a position to impress on such parties, in not resorting to unfulfilled and impracticable promises misleading the electorate.

Supreme Court in a judgement in 2013, directed ECI to frame guidelines to include manifestos (making false promises) as part of MCC. Apex Court observed that false promises shake the root of free and fair elections to a large degree. Consequently, ECI issued guidelines saying that ‘In the interest of transparency, level playing field and credibility of promises, it is expected that manifestos also reflect the rationale for promises and broadly indicate the ways and means to meet the financial requirements for it. Trust of voters should be sought only on those promises which are possible to be fulfilled.’ Apex Court also expressed the view that there is a need for a legislation to be passed by legislature in this regard for governing political parties. Nothing concrete, did happen in spite of all this.

If the election manifestos broadly indicate policies and programmes of the political party, no one shall have any objection. If they depict copious, unfeasible, and unethical promises with the sole purpose of misleading the voter eying the power and later becoming unmindful of those promises, it certainly needs to be checked. If any political party failed to fulfil its election promises made in earlier elections, though they won the election and were in power, it should be penalised, even to the extent that in the subsequent election its manifesto shall be subjected to a thorough scrutiny by a competent authority. This seems to be not happening.

In this context, answering a question at the press meet in Nagpur, after BRS party office inauguration, KCR said that his Government not only fulfilled each and every promise his party made in 2014 and 2018 Assembly Elections’ manifestos, but also had gone beyond, in conceiving and implementing many more welfare measures that were not promised. This is an example consciously worth emulating by other political parties. KCR also said that, India needs qualitative change with electoral reforms forming part of it and BRS will be the change agent.

Against this background, findings of the path-breaking research monograph ‘Poll Expenditure, the 2019 Elections’ of Centre for Media Studies (CMS), an independent research-based think-tank, headed by Dr N Bhaskar Rao, were alarming. SY Quraishi, a former CEC in his introduction to this, said that the election signalled threats to representative form of government. The report made specific mention of violation of MCC and ECI, despite its having elaborate system of surveillance and tracking, maintained silence. And hence, CM KCR’s precisely finding fault with ECI for its failure to stop irrational promises by parties to come to power, and thereby, affecting the democratic fabric of the country, is hundred percent correct.

(The writer is Chief Public Relations Officer to Chief Minister Telangana)