{"id":41107,"date":"2025-10-12T20:00:04","date_gmt":"2025-10-12T20:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ppnewsline.in\/?p=41107"},"modified":"2025-10-12T20:00:47","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T20:00:47","slug":"transparency-in-holding-elections-a-constitutional-obligation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ppnewsline.in\/?p=41107","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Transparency\u00a0\u00a0in holding elections\u00a0\u00a0a constitutional obligation’"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Democracy cannot survive on the basis of opaque processes and unverifiable data.\u00a0\u00a0Politcal parties call for full transparency and institutional accountability, the credibility of the Election Commission<\/a>\u00a0is at stake, and urge to uphold the standards expected of a neutral and constitutional authority. ECI should come clear on the the issue of an alleged discrepancy in voter turnout and the dilution of the election commissioner’s appointment process. Raiseing grave and legitimate questions about the transparency and integrity of the electoral process, particularly in the context of the recently concluded elections.\u00a0\u00a0The People\u00a0\u00a0criticised the rules changing the composition of the appointment panel for the\u00a0Election Commissioners<\/a>, which replaced the Chief Justice of India with the Union Home Minister. However, electoral rolls are revised annually through a participatory exercise. During this annual exercise, the electoral rolls are shared, free of cost, with recognised political parties, , first at the draft stage and second time after its finalisation. The similar exercise was done before 2014 and copies of such electoral rolls were then shared with all the political parties. The concerns about systematic irregularities in the electoral process have shaken public confidence in the Election Commission of India . The ECI refuses to share key information like machine-readable voter rolls and polling booth CCTV footage, citing voter privacy. It has also plainly denied the existence of underlying notes and documents to critical decisions it has made. While voter privacy is a legitimate concern, ECI’s exaggerated response denying information undermines public trust. The discrepancies are found included duplicate voters with fake and invalid addresses, bulk voters or single address voters, voters with invalid photos, and voters misusing Form 6 which is used for registration of new voters. Duplication of voters went so far as having the same Electors Photo Identity Card (EPIC) number being valid in multiple constituencies. Some voters had house numbers that simply said \u201c0\u201d, \u201c\u2013,\u201d or \u201c#,\u201d with no corresponding physical address. Most strikingly, \u201c153 Biere Club<\/em>,\u201d a brewery, was shown as the residence for 68 voters. Several entries had micro-sized or blurred photos of voters. Lastly, Form-6 which is strictly intended for first time voters was subject to widespread misuse for creating multiple registrations for the same person and all registrations were recorded as having cast votes.\u00a0The discrepancies were not isolated errors, but\u00a0documented systemic failures<\/a>\u00a0involving both inclusion of fictitious and duplicitous voters and deletion of legitimate ones. This may be Chief Election Commissioner of India has forgotten that the Election Commission of India is a \u201cpublic authority\u201d under the Right to Information Act, 2005, given that it has been entrusted under Article with the \u201csuperintendence, direction and control\u201d of elections under Article 324 of the Indian Constitution.\u00a0\u00a0There is no doubt that\u00a0\u00a0transparency in holding elections is a constitutional obligation, particularly in India. The requirement is rooted in the principle that elections must be free and fair to uphold a democratic system.\u00a0The obligation for transparency is derived from multiple constitutional provisions and legal interpretations the Supreme Court has repeatedly held that a voter’s right to information is a fundamental part of the right to freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a). This means citizens have the right to know about candidates and how political parties are funded to make an informed choice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Democracy cannot survive on the basis of opaque processes and unverifiable data.\u00a0\u00a0Politcal parties call for full transparency and institutional accountability, the credibility of the Election Commission\u00a0is at stake, and urge to uphold the standards expected of a neutral and constitutional authority. ECI should come clear on the the issue of an alleged discrepancy in voter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40301,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-edit-opinion"],"yoast_head":"\n\u2018Transparency\u00a0\u00a0in holding elections\u00a0\u00a0a constitutional obligation' - PP Newsline<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ppnewsline.in\/?p=41107\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u2018Transparency\u00a0\u00a0in holding elections\u00a0\u00a0a constitutional obligation' - PP Newsline\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"“Democracy cannot survive on the basis of opaque processes and unverifiable data.\u00a0\u00a0Politcal parties call for full transparency and institutional accountability, the credibility of the Election Commission\u00a0is at stake, and urge to uphold the standards expected of a neutral and constitutional authority. 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