[Marxistindia] Condemn Modi Government's Moves to Control the Election Commission

[news from the cpi(m)]

August 11, 2023

Press Statement

 

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the
following statement:

 

Condemn Modi Government's Moves to Control the Election Commission

 

The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) strongly denounces the manner in which the
Modi government is undermining the Constitutionally-mandated independence of
the judiciary by negating judgments of the Supreme Court.

 

A Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court, in its judgment, said that the
Chief Election Commissioner and the Election Commissioners should be
appointed by a committee consisting of the Prime Minister, the Leader of
Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the Chief Justice of India.  The Modi
government has now introduced a Bill where the Chief Justice of India is
replaced by "a Union Cabinet Minister to be nominated by the Prime
Minister".  This ensures that the majority opinion of the Executive will
always prevail.  This destroys the impartiality and the independence of the
Election Commission.  The Constitution of India mandates an impartial
Election Commission, independent of Executive pressures and influence,  to
conduct "free and fair elections".

 

This move by the government comes soon after negating yet another
Constitution Bench judgment of the  Supreme Court on the powers of the Delhi
government.  The Modi government had first issued  an ordinance nullifying
this judgment which was  subsequently legislated by the Parliament. 

 

The Modi government's drive for controlling the independent organs of the
State is abominable.  The CPI(M) will strongly oppose this Bill, that has
been introduced in the Parliament,  and calls upon all the parties committed
to defend and uphold the Constitution of India to come forward to defeat
this Bill.  

 

 

(Muralidharan)

For CPI(M) Central Committee office

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://cpim.org/pipermail/marxistindia_cpim.org/attachments/20230811/a908e1e9/attachment.html>