Congress slams the Election Commission, accuses it of not fulfilling its constitutional duty

Congress criticises the Election Commission of India for bias towards the BJP, failure to uphold constitutional duties, and lack of transparency in voter data.

The Congress on Thursday slammed the Election Commission (EC) for advising Opposition leaders that they should refrain from saying the Constitution is in danger as well as over its affidavit in the Supreme Court with regard to disclosing voter data on its website.

Addressing a press conference at the party headquarters, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi sharply criticised the EC’s argument that data contained in Form 17C can be morphed or distorted if it is uploaded on its website. He said it is unfortunate and condemnable that the poll body is not fulfilling its constitutional duty and its inclination is “one-sided”.

Mr. Singhvi also accused the EC of trying to be “the election department” of the Bharatiya Janata Party by not acting on the complaints of model code violations by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. Instead, he said, the EC is creating “false equivalences” by giving generalised directions to political parties.

His comments came after the EC gave an affidavit in the Supreme Court, saying “indiscriminate disclosure” of polling station-wise voter-turnout data and posting the figures on its website will cause chaos in the election machinery, which is already in motion for the ongoing Lok Sabha election.

“The EC has become one-sided and blindsided by one particular party. All this is being done unfortunately, because the EC wants to become the election department of the Government of India,” Mr. Singhvi said.

He said the EC’s actions on complaints against the BJP top brass and in the non-disclosure of voter data do not befit a high-level constitutional institution.

“This is against the constitutional responsibilities of the institution. This is the Election Commission, not the election agent of any party. When a constitutional institution does not follow the Constitution and shows inclination towards power, then it should be understood that this is the end of democracy,” he said.