New Delhi: Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Gyanesh Kumar, both bureaucrats, have been selected to fill the two vacant positions in the top echelon of the Election Commission of India, as revealed by Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Thursday.
Chowdhury disclosed that he was a part of the panel convened by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to nominate two Election Commissioners to assist Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar as the election body gears up for the impending Lok Sabha elections. Apart from the Prime Minister and Chowdhury, Union Home Minister Amit Shah also sat on the panel.
Chowdhury criticised the government’s decision to replace the Chief Justice of India with a Union Minister on the selection committee, arguing that the Chief Justice of India should have retained a seat on the committee.
He lamented that the legislation enacted last year had rendered the committee’s deliberations a mere formality, given the government’s majority control. He expressed frustration at being presented with a list of 212 names for consideration the previous night, without ample time for scrutiny.
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Despite his efforts to obtain a shortlist, he was only furnished with one just ten minutes before the meeting, which he deemed insufficient for proper evaluation.
The Congress leader highlighted his dissent regarding the selection process and referenced the recent resignation of Arun Goel as Election Commissioner, remarking on the rapid turnover in the position.
Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Gyanesh Kumar, both retired IAS officers from the 1988 batch, were identified as the chosen candidates. Sandhu hails from the Uttarakhand cadre of IAS, whereas Kumar is from the Kerala cadre.
Sandhu has previously held significant governmental roles, including Chief Secretary of Uttarakhand and chairman of the National Highways Authority of India, while Kumar has served as secretary in the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and the Ministry of Cooperation led by Amit Shah.
The selection of the two officers occurred just before the Supreme Court’s scheduled hearing of petitions challenging the selection process. Under the current procedure, a search committee headed by the Law Minister compiles a shortlist, which is then deliberated upon by a selection panel led by the Prime Minister, along with the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha and a Union Minister.
In March of the previous year, the Supreme Court had mandated that the selection panel must include the Prime Minister, the Chief Justice of India, and the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha.
However, subsequent legislation replaced the Chief Justice with a Union Minister, thereby favouring the Centre. The Association for Democratic Reforms and Congress leader Jaya Thakur have contested this alteration in the Supreme Court, with the matter scheduled for tomorrow’s hearing.
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