The Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar on Saturday formally announced the dates of the upcoming Lok Sabha election which will be held in seven phases across April and May throughout the country to elect the next Union government. The Chief Commissioner in his press conference listed out the challenges the Commission faces when holding what is said to be the world’s largest election.
The Chief Election Commissioner was at pains to explain that “the Commission is totally committed to maintain the purity of elections and to deliver free, fair, transparent, peaceful, inclusive, accessible, ethical and participative elections in the entire country” and appealed to “all the stakeholders and in particular, the political parties and the candidates, to uphold the peerless democratic traditions of the nation by maintaining high standards of political discourse and fair play in course of their election campaigns.” As part of its duty, the Commission listed out the ways and means it intends to keep track of election expenditures, keep a check on public discourse during the campaign and monitor the media.
It is of course easier said than done. In a situation where it is not possible to police everybody all the time, the onus on ensuring a level playing field lies not just with the referees of the match, but also on the players who need to play by the rules of the game lest it descend into an unsightly spectacle.
Over the last ten years, the nation has seen an increasingly unbalanced playing field that is leaning in favour of the ruling party -- both in terms of how the spending power of the ruling party versus the opposition as well as the misuse of government machinery to give undue benefits to the ruling party in the run-up to the polls. Indeed, mere verbal assurances by the Election Commission of India that it will be monitoring and cracking down on the misuse of money and muscle power in the elections do little to inspire confidence that this will indeed be a free and fair election.
Questions have been raised about the impartiality of the Election Commission itself, which was only recently reconstituted by a committee in which the very government that is seeking a third term of power has a majority say.
The onus therefore lies on members of the opposition political parties, election officials at all levels, the media as the fourth pillar of democracy and the voters to highlight violations and force the authorities to act to crush attempts at violating the code of conduct. At a larger level, the country deserves an Election Commission that is not reduced to a toothless tiger with little power to prosecute -- but instead one that is seen as taking its job very seriously unfazed by the task ahead of them or the power wielded by those they are tasked with keeping in check.
It is incumbent on the Election Commission to prove through actions, and not just words, that it is taking its job seriously and will unhesitatingly act against those who violate the code, no matter which side of the political aisle they belong to.
