At Nirvachan Sadan

TO the extent individuals do make a difference to institutions, it must be the devout wish of all citizens that Om Prakash Rawat would do his utmost to arrest the decline in the Nirvachan Sadan’s prestige and reputation. Rawat succeeds AK Joti as the Chief Election Commissioner. Unfortunately, Joti has come to be seen as a partisan figure, all too inclined to give undeserving breaks  to the ruling party.  The Election Commission’s reputation as a neutral referee suffered all too palpably during the Gujarat Assembly elections last year. It will be Rawat’s primary task to recover the lost ground. He has the reputation of being a man of great integrity and rectitude, someone who can be entrusted to perform well the task of presiding over the Nirvachan Sadan. On his watch, Assembly elections will be held in the Northeast, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. 

As per the existing arrangement, the members to the Election Commission are appointed by the government of the day. A new member, Ashok Lavasa, has been named to fill the vacancy caused by Joti’s departure. Given the appointment procedure, it is only natural that certain preferences and connections do come into play. But since TN Seshan’s day, the Nirvachan Sadan has transformed itself into a formidable constitutional watchdog; so much so, that no Chief Election Commissioner has tried to dilute the Sadan’s autonomy — that is till AK Joti tried to write a different script.

With Rawat at the helm as the CEC and with the induction of a new Commissioner, the internal chemistry of the Election Commission will have to be worked out anew. As our politics has become more contentious, our electoral contests too have come to be waged bitterly and, if possible, unfairly. Winning is the only game in town. While it is not the commission’s task to inculcate a new morality among political parties, it can certainly see to it that they function as per the existing laws and that the electoral arena does not get reduced to an uneven field. A robustly vigilant and scrupulously neutral umpire is essential to electoral democracy and its legitimacy.