BJP Defends Election Commission, Calls CEC-EC Exchanges a Sign of Democratic Functioning
BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said recorded objections by two Election Commissioners reflect healthy deliberation, not institutional discord, and rejected Opposition claims on the SIR process.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday pushed back against Opposition allegations of internal discord within the Election Commission of India, arguing that recorded communications between the Chief Election Commissioner and two Election Commissioners are evidence of the institution's democratic working rather than a sign of dysfunction.
Addressing a press conference, BJP MP and spokesperson Sambit Patra said the Commission ultimately arrives at unanimous decisions after a process of deliberation. If the three Commissioners never consulted one another and simply assented, he argued, the same Opposition parties would level charges of authoritarianism. The exchanges, he said, demonstrate a functioning democracy.
His remarks followed an ECI statement responding to a news report that two of the three Election Commissioners, Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi, had formally recorded objections at least 14 times over a span of ten months.
Patra accused the Congress and other Opposition parties of persistently trying to sow distrust among voters in constitutional institutions after being repeatedly rejected at the ballot box. He alleged that their latest target was the Election Commission and the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, and accused the Congress of links to multiple past controversies over the poll body's independence and impartiality.
On the Opposition's challenge to the SIR process, Patra said the Supreme Court had upheld its legal validity on multiple occasions. Responding to allegations of "vote theft" after current CEC Gyanesh Kumar assumed office in February 2025, he pointed to results from the recently concluded West Bengal polls. In the 20 Assembly seats with the highest number of electors deleted, the Trinamool Congress won 13, the BJP six and the Congress one, he said. In the 49 constituencies where deletions exceeded the eventual victory margin, the BJP won 26, the TMC 21 and the Congress two.
Patra also turned to the post-retirement careers of former Election Commissioners, saying the "birth of manipulation" and of scams began with the Congress. He cited K.V.K. Sundaram, Nagendra Singh and R.K. Trivedi, who received Padma honours, with Trivedi later serving as Governor; V.S. Ramadevi, subsequently appointed Governor; T.N. Seshan, who later contested on a Congress ticket; and M.S. Gill, who became a Congress Rajya Sabha member and Union Minister. He also named J.M. Lyngdoh, N. Gopalaswami and Navin Chawla, who became CEC in 2009 and oversaw that year's Lok Sabha polls.
Referring to V.S. Sampath's appointment as CEC in 2012, Patra said L.K. Advani had strongly objected at the time, calling it unjust and pressing for a collegium to select the Chief Election Commissioner. Until 2023, he added, Election Commissioners were appointed by the Prime Minister at his own discretion.
In March 2023, the Supreme Court laid down an interim mechanism, to hold until Parliament enacted a law, under which the President appoints the CEC and Election Commissioners on the advice of a three-member committee comprising the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the Chief Justice of India.