Independent panel should appoint CEC, says Advani

Express news service
Posted: Feb 02, 2009

New Delhi: In the wake of the controversy surrounding the appointment of the next Chief Election Commissioner, NDA’s

PM candidate L K Advani has called for making the exercise to appoint CECs broad-based and democratic.

“Credit for the Election Commission’s independence must be given to the Constituent Assembly. There were, however,

eminent participants in the Constituent Assembly debate on Art. 324, who wanted the Election Commission to be invested

with even greater independence than given to it¿,” wrote Advani in his latest post on his blog.

Advani suggested that an independent panel should decide on appointments like those of CECs. “In 2006, the then Chief

Election Commissioner B N Tandon, in a letter to Rashtrapati APJ Abdul Kalam, had pleaded with the Government that just

as in the case of the Central Vigilance Commission and the NHRC, the appointments are made not by the Executive but by

Committees in which the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and Leaders of Opposition in Parliament are also included, in case of

the Election Commission also, a similar Committee should be authorised to do so,” he wrote.

Former secretary to the Election Commissioner, K J Rao, said such a proposal was initially mooted by the Goswami

Commission in 1990. “The Law Commission, the Venkatachaliah Committee to review the working of the Constitution, too,

had mooted similar proposals,” Rao said. “An independent panel consisting the PM, Leader of Opposition, LS Speaker,

RS Chairman, instead of just the executive, should nominate the CEC. There should be a political consensus on this,” he

added.

Advani also asked CEC N Gopalaswami’s recommendation on Navin Chawla to be “accepted forthwith”.

“On behalf of the BJP, Party General Secretary Arun Jaitley has rightly argued that the word ‘recommendation’ used in the

second proviso of Article 324(3) must be construed as a binding recommendation,” he wrote in the post.

“Jaitley has drawn attention to Article 217 of the Constitution relating to appointment of High Court Judges where the

appointment is to be ‘after consultation with the Chief Justice’, the Chief Justice’s views has always been regarded

binding,” he wrote.