SOURCE :- SIASAT NEWS
The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear next week a petition which raised doubts over the decisions taken by the Election Commission of India led by Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
The matter was mentioned before a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana.
Senior advocate Vikas Singh, who mentioned the matter, told the bench that as per the statutory scheme, decisions of the multi-member Election Commission have to be unanimous or by majority.
“The way the Election Commission is functioning, there is serious doubt over whether the decisions are unanimous,” he submitted.
The plea comes in the backdrop of a report in the Indian Express which claimed that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi Sandhu had objected on record at least 14 times over the past 10 months to decisions and orders on Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls that they said were issued without their knowledge or recommendation
However, the poll panel had said in a statement that the letters sent by Sandhu and Joshi to the Cabinet Secretary pertained to an officer on deputation, rather than policy or IT division matters.
The Indian Youth Congress on Thursday launched an online petition demanding the removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar following a report by the Indian Express on internal objections by election commissioners over voter deletions.
According to an official statement, the petition, titled “Gyanesh, It’s Done Bro”, also calls for Kumar’s arrest and prosecution, a comprehensive investigation into the electoral process and rolls, and the public release of electoral records and internal objections of the Election Commission.
The petition comes a day after the IYC staged a protest in Delhi demanding Kumar’s resignation, citing an Indian Express report which revealed that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi recorded objections on at least 14 occasions over the past 10 months on issues related to electoral rolls and the functioning of the poll panel.
The reported objections concerned, among other things, the addition and deletion of voters, changes to Form 6 used for new voter registration, and the centralisation of electoral-roll systems, the statement read.
SOURCE : SIASAT
