Supreme Court's Landmark Directive to Election Commission

On 2nd May, the Supreme Court of India delivered a landmark direction to the Election Commission (EC) of India. According to that directive, the Election Commission should make all information about each contesting candidate available to the voters. It has to call for on affidavit from each candidate seeking election to Parliament or a State Legislature, whether the candidate is convicted/acquitted/discharged of any criminal offence in the past with particulars of punishment, if any, and also whether prior to six months of filing of nomination whether the candidate is accused in any pending case, of any offence punishable with imprisonment for two years or more, and in which charge is framed or cognizance is taken by the court of law. The candidate should furnish the details of these at the time of filing their nomination papers. The EC is also asked to obtain the particulars of assets and liabilities of a candidate and of his/her spouse and that of dependents.

This is definitely a welcome step as this would help in cleansing the politics. It is to be noted that currently also the Election Commission seeks an affidavit from candidates giving information of any conviction in a criminal case. Its usefulness is a common knowledge. It is not clear how the Supreme Court's directive would be implemented in a foolproof way and what would be the punishment if the contesting candidate withholds certain information or furnishes wrong information. Having said that, the Supreme Court's directive would definitely help in enhancing the scope of the campaign against criminalisation of the electoral politics.

The interesting feature of this directive is that the onus is now on the Election Commission to educate the voters about the profile of the contesting candidates as per the expanded power of Article 19. It also widens the scope of Commission's power under Article 324. Until now, if the conviction stage of a case is not reached, the EC could not prevent a candidate from contesting. In this context, the new directive of the Apex Court assumes significance. Even now, the EC can not reject the nomination if the candidate is not convicted for more than two years, but it is bound by the new directive to publicize among the voters the details of the charges faced by the candidate. As per the widened scope of Article 19 (1), it is now a part of freedom of speech and statement and part of the fundamental rights of the citizen to know the antecedents of the candidates at the time of election. The EC would now educate the voters that their representative faces the possibility of getting disqualified in the event of a conviction after he or she is elected. In that sense, EC is bound to do this for the voters and can not be interpreted that EC is infringing the rights of the candidates.

The EC has to soon act on this directive and assume powers under Art 324. The confidence and optimism on the beneficial effects of this directive comes from the fact that the Court has advised the EC to set the rules in this area rather than depend on Parliament to legislate. It is unfortunate that Parliament failed to amend the Representation of the People Act to this effect and the Supreme Court has to step in to give the directive. It would cleanse the electoral politics only to the extent if the voter is not able to get information on the candidate. The voters elect candidates without even going through their profile. They vote based on party affiliations and caste affiliations. This should change and they should scrutinize the profile of candidates, which would be made available hereafter in an authentic way and vote in an unbiased objective way. They should not yield to any sectarian propaganda and get attracted by populist actions or intimated by the candidate's muscle power. The major cleansing of our electoral politics would happen only if our citizenry wake up and vote for the genuinely good candidates and the educated elite go to pooling booths who are anyway have umpteen opportunities to know about the candidate's profile even without the Apex Court's directive to EC.