The electoral body, which manages the biggest electoral exercise on Earth, struggles to act against poll violations.
In 2011, Hillary Clinton, a former US secretary of state and presidential candidate, during her visit to India, referred to India’s electoral commission as a “global gold standard” in election management.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) – a constitutional authority – has successfully conducted 16 general elections since the country’s independence from British rule in 1947.
Voting for India’s multi-phase general elections kicked off last week with 900 million people eligible to vote in the biggest democratic exercise in the world.
And more than 11 million election officials deployed to over one million polling stations located in every nook and cranny of the country will ensure that the process goes smoothly.
To administer free and fair elections, the ECI framed a Model Code of Conduct (MCC), a set of guidelines for candidates and political parties, that came into effect as soon as the election dates were announced and will stay in force until the results are declared.
As per MCC guidelines, candidates and political parties are banned from invoking religion and caste in campaigning while a limit has been placed on expenditures by candidates and parties.
Incumbent governments are also barred from announcing new schemes and programmes after the MCC comes into force.
But it seems the ECI, touted as the most powerful electoral body in the world, has struggled to act against violators.
In the past few weeks alone, the ECI has received hundreds of thousands of complaints alleging violations of the MCC.
On April 1, while addressing a rally in Maharashtra’s Wardha district, Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacked opposition Congress party leader Rahul Gandhi’s decision to contest the election from Kerala’s Wayanad seat – which has a significant Muslim presence – saying the Congress was “afraid” of fielding candidates from constituencies dominated by Hindus.
