DC Edit | Transparency essential to safeguard EC’s autonomy

The President of India’s order appointing election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar as the chief election commissioner of India puts into effect the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023, but the midnight communication has not abated the legal challenges mounted against the piece of legislation. It was in 1991 that Parliament passed the Election Commission Act which made it a multi-member panel but the selection process remained with the executive. The Supreme Court, in 2023, found the process flawed and put in place a panel comprising the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the Chief Justice of India to recommend names to the President for appointment as CEC and ECs. The court reasoned that the “founding fathers clearly contemplated a law by Parliament and did not intend the executive exclusively calling the shots in the matter of appointments to the Election Commission”. The law put the entire process back exclusively in the domain of the executive — a three-member search committee led by a minister and a three-member selection panel where the Prime Minister and a minister of his choice are present, in all probability, can zero in on a person of the choice of the Prime Minister, given that ministers continue in the office during the pleasure of the President who acts on the advice of the Prime Minister.