On March 16, 2024, the Election Commission of India announced a surprisingly long duration of the Lok Sabha elections and with it came into force the Model Code of Conduct (MCC). The MCC is a set of guidelines issued to regulate political parties and candidates prior to elections. The rules range from issues related to speeches, polling day, polling booths, portfolios, the content of election manifestos, processions, and general conduct, so that free and fair elections are conducted. One of the most important points in the MCC for a diverse country like India is:
“No party or candidate shall include in any
activity which may aggravate existing differences or create mutual hatred or
cause tension between different castes and communities, religious or
linguistic.”
The MCC also says:
“..Criticism
of other parties or their workers based on unverified allegations or
distortion shall be avoided.”
“There shall be no appeal to
caste or communal feelings for securing votes. Mosques, Churches, Temples or
other places of worship shall not be used as forum for election propaganda.”
Sadly, it is neither surprising nor unexpected
that the BJP leaders and campaigners are blatantly spreading hate on the
basis of religion and lies. I wrote about BJP’s numero uno campaigner’s hate
and lies in this
blog post. Scroll journalists Tabassum Barnagarwala and Abhik Deb did the unenvious
job of going through 5 days worth of speeches by the numero uno and fact
checking each and every claim. They found a plethora of lies and divisive
statements.
Other ministers and campaigners of the BJP took
their cue from the parivar pramukh and spread similar lies and hate. Here are just
some highlights low lights:
Amit Shah said
in West Bengal that Mamta Banerjee’s government is one of “mullas, madrassas
and mafia”
Violating multiple points of the MCC in one
speech in West Bengal, the UP chief minister, Ajay Bisht said that “Bengali
Hindus participated in the Ram Janmabhoomi movement to demolish the structure
of slavery”
(HindutvaWatch
is an excellent resource to see the amount of hate done by Hindutvavadis. But
it is extremely depressing as well. Please use discretion while going through
their timeline. Kudos to them for doing this amazing documentation work!)
Union Minister Anurag Thakur (of goli maaro
saalo ko fame) said in Himachal Pradesh that in Congress manifesto it
is written that they plan to give your (Hindu) children's property to Muslims.
It says a lot about our political discourse and
mainstream media that the BJP believes it can get away with spreading lies
about what is written in the Congress manifesto when it is the
easiest fact check in the world. On 1st May, students from Galgotiya
University in Noida marched to the Congress headquarters in Delhi to protest
against supposed references to inheritance tax and wealth redistribution in their manifesto. Sadly, many students could not answer simple
questions about their concern, motive or placards. Even more depressing and
concerning were the reading skills of some of the college students.
The BJP’s Instagram account went many steps further
in spreading hate and lies. They uploaded this horrible crude
video building on the lies about the Congress manifesto redistributing
wealth but going many steps further (and back) directly comparing it to the
Muslim league. The video, which has thankfully been taken down, also says that ancient
India was so prosperous that ‘each and every’ average citizen had plenty of
gold and ‘invaders’ looted us and destroyed temples. It actually has this line –
“If you are a non-Muslim, Congress will snatch your wealth and distribute it to
Muslims”.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission of India (an independent, constitutional body in charge of conducting free and fair elections) seems to have adopted the original Japanese proverb – “see not, hear not, say not.” They have taken no action themselves against BJP for the blatant lies, hate speech, use of religious symbols or targeting of minorities. When the Congress party, CPI(M) and civil society activists urged them to act, they behaved as if the Prime Minister is Lord Voldemort and sent a notice to BJP President JP Nadda asking for comments on behalf of BJP's “star campaigners” instead of directly seeking explanations from the biggest “star” himself.
In related news, there is also a huge
concern over the Election Commission’s voter turnout data. There was an
unprecedented delay in releasing the data after the first two phases of the
election. The voter turnout data for the first phase was released 11 days after polling ended, while the second phase data was released 4 days afterwards.
It is indeed sad that the Election Commission
of India is in such disarray. It has an illustrious history of conducting successful
elections in the biggest democracy in the world. The first Chief Election
Commissioner of India, Sukumar Sen, not only oversaw India’s first two
elections, but also was the first Chief Election Commissioner of Sudan. This excellent
episode on the Bharatiya Junta Podcast talks about him in the context of India’s
first ever elections.
Why are the current Election Commission members acting
so helpless then? The answer may lie in how they are being appointed. Last year
in March, a Supreme Court Constitution Bench ruled that the appointment of the
Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners must be done on the
recommendation of a committee consisting of the Chief Justice of India (CJI),
the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha. This would
ensure an impartial selection. However, on 12th December 2023, the BJP cleared
a Bill which changed the committee to remove the CJI and instead
replace him/her with a Union Cabinet minister nominated by the prime minister.
Oh and it just so happens that when this Bill was cleared, 146 opposition MPs
were suspended
from Parliament. This again was unprecedented.
3 months after passing the new law to appoint
Election Commissioners and just weeks before the biggest election in the world,
Arun Goel, whose term was supposed to last till 2027, quit suddenly. No one
knows the reason but there are rumours of rifts with the current CEC, Rajiv
Kumar. Goel is not the only Commissioner to quit suddenly. In August 2020,
Ashok Lavasa, resigned just months short of becoming the Chief Election
Commissioner. He was the only member of the 3-person commission to rule that PM
Modi violated the Model Code of Conduct while campaigning for the 2019 general elections.
His demand that dissent notes should be recorded in the commission’s orders on
model code violations was rejected with a majority vote. ‘Coincidentally,’ his
wife, sister and son had all received notices from the Income Tax department.
After Arun Goel resigned suddenly, the
Government of India appointed 2 new Election Commissioners just two days before
the elections were announced. The ‘impartial’ committee headed by PM Modi did
not give any time to the only opposition member in the
committee - Congress Leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury. The names of shortlisted
officers were not made available to him in advance despite his request. The Government
sent him the names of over 200 officers just one day before on Wednesday, 13th
March. On Thursday, he was given a short list of 6 names just moments before the
meeting. Then Amit Shah proposed two names and PM Modi asked him for his “opinion”.
Small mercy for following
process, at least for the sake of it. For what its worth, Chowdhury recorded
his formal dissent and the Supreme Court heard the case due to many petitions
filed challenging the validity of the law on the appointment of election
commissioners. However, since the general elections were just around the
corner, the Supreme Court did not want to take any actions and just “reprimanded”
the government and said that they could have examined the names more slowly.
Thank you, my lords! This wonderful cartoon by PenPencilDraw completely sums up the current situation:
