Now that Navin Chawla and V.S. Sampat have assumed charge as India’s chief election commissioner and election commissioner respectively, I hope last year’s bitter controversy will be forgotten. All political parties should refrain from dragging the EC into political controversies. The BJP’s Arun Jaitley has no love lost for Navin Chawla, and misses no opportunity to attack him, disregarding the fact that in this media age, the EC cannot take sides or harass any party.

The real issue must rise above persons and settle on the institution of Election Commission. The commission is an independent constitutional body and its commissioners are seen as constitutional appointees.

There is no doubt that elections in India are now fiercely independent. The Election Commission has supreme authority. No politician is able to unduly influence elections, and booth capturing is a thing of the past. All this has happened because the EC has worked towards earning its distinct authority over the last ten years.

The Congress never made any attempt to question the conduct of the outgoing CEC N. Gopalaswamy throughout his term, though everyone knew of his closeness to BJP’s LK Advani. Congress knew that accusing Gopalaswamy for any lapses would be tantamount to denigrating the credibility of EC and harm national interest. The new appointees in Navin Chawla and Qureshi deserve similar respect from all parties; or else the consequences will prove damaging for India for a long time to come.

Why only Vajpayee?

BJP senior leader Jaswant Singh’s latest attempt at damage control over the terrorists’ release during the Kandahar episode is nothing more than farce. In his attempt to rescue Advani, Singh has now suddenly remembered that he was actually against releasing the terrorists, but had to be convinced by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. So it is Vajpayee who must take more than his fair share of the blame, not Advani who was the home minister and also deputy PM at the time. The attempt to drag Vajpayee into the centre of the storm is in extremely poor taste. Vajpayee has been keeping ill for a long time and he cannot even defend himself publicly. But he must be pained to see his own colleagues reducing him to a political scapegoat.

... contd.