TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee has also spoken to Congress Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi over Gyanesh Kumar and alleged electoral irregularities. The September 30 meeting is expected to bring senior INDIA bloc leaders together to discuss the poll panel and SIR.
BY PC Bureau
NEW DELHI/ September 26: Opposition parties of the INDIA bloc are set to meet in New Delhi on September 30 to discuss the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and growing concerns over Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
The meeting is expected to be held at the Constitution Club of India, with senior leaders of the alliance likely to attend. The proposed meeting comes amid mounting political controversy over the SIR exercise and reports of differences within the three-member Election Commission over several decisions relating to electoral rolls.
The discussions follow consultations among former West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee, Congress leaders and CPI(M) general secretary M.A. Baby, along with leaders of other opposition parties. The final list of participants is yet to be confirmed.
The parties are expected to discuss whether they can formulate a coordinated response on the functioning of the Election Commission, the SIR exercise and concerns over the conduct of the revision of electoral rolls.
The proposed meeting assumes significance following an Indian Express investigation that reported that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had formally recorded objections on at least 14 occasions over a 10-month period to decisions concerning electoral rolls, including new voter registration, deletion and restoration of names, changes to Form 6 and aspects of the election body’s voter-data systems.
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The Election Commission, however, has rejected the suggestion that these internal notes represented a split in the poll panel. It has said that differing views are part of institutional deliberations and maintained that final decisions, including those relating to SIR, were taken unanimously by all three commissioners.
The opposition’s concerns have also been fuelled by the scale of the SIR exercise. The Indian Express reported that more than 13 crore names had been left out of draft electoral rolls across 30 states and Union Territories following the revision. The figure and its implications have become a major political point of contention, with opposition parties questioning the manner in which voters have been identified for exclusion and verification.
In Delhi, the SIR has also generated controversy, with more than 31 lakh electors receiving notices over discrepancies or other issues identified in the electoral database. The Election Commission has clarified that receiving such a notice does not by itself mean that a voter’s name will be deleted.
The issue has already reached the Supreme Court. In proceedings concerning the Delhi SIR, the court raised concerns about notices that appeared to have been issued mechanically and discussed allowing voters to respond through electronic means such as WhatsApp and email.
Meanwhile, Trinamool Congress national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee is understood to have spoken to Congress Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi earlier this week about Gyanesh Kumar and alleged irregularities in the electoral process.
The opposition consultations for a larger meeting had been under way before the September 30 date was fixed. The meeting could provide a platform for the INDIA bloc parties to discuss a common political and parliamentary response to the Election Commission and the SIR process.
The proposed gathering comes at a time when the poll panel has sought to maintain that its decisions remain unanimous, while opposition parties have intensified their scrutiny of the commission’s functioning and the implementation of the electoral-roll revision.
