Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh. File
| Photo Credit: Sushil Kumar Verma
The Congress on Saturday (December 21, 2024) claimed that a change in rules regarding the conduct of elections is “a vindication of our assertions regarding the rapidly eroding integrity of the electoral process managed by the Election Commission of India (ECI)”.
Congress communication chief Jairam Ramesh, in a post on X, tagged a media report that claimed that the Union Law Ministry, in consultation with the ECI, effected a change in the rules after the Punjab and Haryana High Court asked the ECI to supply all information including video and CCTV footage pertaining to a particular booth in the recent Haryana Assembly polls to the petitioner.
On Friday (Dec. 20), the Law Ministry, through a Gazette notification, had changed Rule 93(2)(a) of the 1961 Conduct of Election Rules under the Representation of the People Act, 1951. Earlier, the said rule stated that “all other papers relating to the election shall be open to public inspection”. However, it has now been changed to read:“all other papers as specified in these rules relating to the election shall be open to public inspection”.
“If there was ever a vindication of our assertions regarding the rapidly eroding integrity of the electoral process managed by the Election Commission of India in recent times, this is it. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and information will restore faith in the process — a reasoning the Punjab and Haryana High Court agreed with when it directed the ECI to share all information that it is legally required to do so with the public,” said Mr. Ramesh.
“Yet the ECI, instead of complying with the judgment, rushes to amend the law to curtail the list of what can be shared. Why is the ECI so afraid of transparency? This move of the ECI will be challenged legally right away,” he added.
Published – December 21, 2024 04:19 pm IST