Supreme Court to Hear Plea on Election Commission's Decision-Making Powers

The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear next week a petition that questions how the Election Commission of India is functioning, alleging that authority vested in the poll panel as a multi-member constitutional body is being exercised without the collective decision-making process required by statute.

Senior advocate Vikas Singh mentioned the matter before a bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, seeking early listing. He submitted that the statutory scheme requires decisions of the multi-member Commission to be unanimous or, where members differ, by majority.

The petition has been filed under Article 32 by Rakesh Kumar Singh, a petitioner from Bihar. It seeks a direction concerning Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, contending that the CEC, as Chairman of the Commission, cannot individually exercise powers that Article 324 vests in the Election Commission as a body.

The plea draws on at least 14 contemporaneous objections said to have been recorded by Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi between October 2025 and August 2026. These include allegations that communications were issued in the name of the ECI without Commission approval, that agendas and minutes of meetings were not circulated for more than a year, and that changes were made to electoral-roll systems without the participation or approval of the two Commissioners.

A central grievance concerns the alteration of Form 6 during the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. Commissioner Joshi is said to have objected that the form could not be changed to require SIR-linked disclosures without amending the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, an objection later endorsed by Sandhu. The disputed field was nonetheless introduced in July 2026, and Sandhu subsequently described the change as "unauthorised and illegal".

The petition also raises concerns about the alleged centralisation of the electoral-roll database and access to ERONet/ECINet by statutory field-level authorities. Joshi had proposed an independent audit of database access credentials, while Sandhu later questioned the authority of the ECI's Director General (IT) to restrict access available to statutory electoral officers.

Another issue relates to appeals filed in the name of the ECI before West Bengal Appellate Tribunals against voters whose inclusion had been directed by judicial officers. Sandhu is said to have questioned who authorised the filing of those appeals and under what authority.

The petitioner argues that Article 324 vests electoral powers in the "Election Commission" and not in the CEC individually, relying heavily on the Supreme Court's 1995 Constitution bench judgment in TN Seshan v/s Union of India, which recognised the substantive decision-making role of Election Commissioners in a multi-member Commission. The plea also relies on Section 18 of the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023, which provides that the Commission's business should, as far as possible, be transacted unanimously and, where members differ, decided by majority.

Seeking examination of the Commission's primary records, including agendas, minutes, approval sheets, file notings, work-allocation orders and IT-access records, the petitioner has submitted that the allegations should not be treated as conclusively establishing illegality merely on the basis of media reports. The records, the plea says, should be produced to determine whether the disputed actions were authorised in accordance with Article 324 and Section 18.

Among the interim reliefs sought are the preservation of electoral-roll data and audit trails, a direction against further substantive alteration of Form 6, and protection against irreversible changes to electoral-roll data pending adjudication. The petitioner has also sought an interim direction restraining Gyanesh Kumar from exercising the functions of CEC and requiring the Commission's business to be transacted by the other two Commissioners.

The main prayer seeks a declaration that powers under Article 324 must be exercised by the ECI as a multi-member body in accordance with Section 18, and that communications, orders, directions or appeals cannot be issued in the name of the Commission without a decision taken unanimously or, where necessary, by majority.