Opposition submits fresh notice seeking CEC Gyanesh Kumar’s removal | India News
New Delhi: Opposition MPs in the Rajya Sabha on Friday submitted a fresh notice to the RS Secretary General to send a motion to remove Gyanesh Kumar as Chief Election Commissioner on the grounds of “proven misconduct”.Earlier this month, notices submitted by opposition MPs in both LS and RS were rejected by the Speaker and Chairman respectively. The opposition has raised nine new allegations against Kumar in its fresh notice.Congress spokesperson Jairam Ramesh XA said that “73 opposition MPs of the RS have submitted a fresh notice to its general secretary to submit an ‘address to the President’ for the removal of CEC Gyanesh Kumar”.According to Ramesh, the proposal is sought “on the basis of proven misconduct” – an example of the EC’s “social talk” social media post after a meeting with a TMC delegation on April 8. The meeting ended on a tense note, with TMC leaders saying that the CEC had asked them to “get lost” and blame the EC.“There are now nine specific allegations against the CEC which have been documented in great detail and which cannot be denied or whitewashed. Its continuation is an attack on the Constitution. It is highly disrespectful that the man remains in office doing the bidding of the PM and HM,” Ramesh said.The resolution was signed by MPs from Congress, TMC, DMK, SP, RJD, CPI, CPM, NCP (SP), Shiv Sena (UBT), JMM, IUML, NC and AAP.As part of the fresh complaint, the opposition accused Kumar of “continuing partisan irregularities in the implementation of the Model Code of Conduct”, alleging that the EC failed to act on complaints against the defeated Constitution Amendment Bill on women’s reservation in the assembly elections in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s April 18 address to the nation. The CEC has “issued no show-cause notice, given any advice, and no public response” to the allegations made in this regard, it said.Other allegations include “administrative lapses evidencing institutional proximity to the ruling party” and “conduct of a constitutional activist”, where they referred to the summary termination of meetings with the TMC.The list of grievances involved the deletion of about 91 lakh voters in West Bengal and the judicial disenfranchisement of about 34 lakh voters.Other allegations include “deliberate failure to act on specific and documented allegations of official bias” and “nationwide replication of flawed SIR structures”.
