India’s Election Commission allows Modi to continue ‘brazen violations’: Opposition

• There was a brazen continuation of the violations: opposition.
• The warden is responsible for making sure that parties do not break the rules.
• The letter lists 10 allegations against Modi and key aides.
  

NEW DELHI: India’s opposition said the nation’s election commission was allowing Prime Minister Narendra Modi to continue with “rampant and brazen” violations by failing to act on opposition complaints of religious hate speech and misrepresentations.

More than halfway through India’s six-week national election, the world’s biggest, the opposition led by the Congress party complained in a letter to India’s Election Commission on Friday that “no meaningful action has been taken to punish those who are guilty of the regime decision”.

This was a “complete abdication” of the committee’s duty, it said. “As a result there has been an unchecked and brazen continuation of these violations, which are now being committed with impunity and utter contempt.”

The watchdog is responsible for ensuring that political parties do not violate election rules against promoting division on religious, caste or linguistic lines in the multi-ethnic South Asian nation.

In his campaign speeches, Modi, seeking a rare third consecutive term, has taken aim at the Congress, arguing that it wants to help minority Muslims at the expense of other socially disadvantaged groups.

Spokesmen for the commission and Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) did not respond to requests for comment.

Election results in the world’s most populous nation will be announced on June 4.

The commission on Tuesday ordered social media platform X to take down a video posted by a BJP state unit that accused Congress leaders of planning to extend welfare benefits to Muslims at the expense of other disadvantaged tribal and Hindu caste groups.

While taking no decision on the allegations, the panel sought a response from BJP chief JP Nadda over an April 21 speech in which Modi said the Congress planned to redistribute wealth from Hindus to Muslims, the whom he called “filterers” and “those with many children”.

The commission also sent a notice to the Congress over complaints by the BJP, which it says has filed three complaints.

“The delay calls into question the credibility of the election commission and hence the election process,” said SY Qureshi, former chief of the three-member election commission. “Any damage to her reputation will cause incalculable damage to the legitimacy of India’s democracy.”

The opposition letter lists 10 complaints filed by the Congress since April 6 against Modi and key aides for what it calls “divisive,” “false” and “provocative” statements that sow sectarian division and misrepresent Congress positions.

“We are not being told what is the response, what is the action being taken,” Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi told reporters after meeting Commission officials on Friday.

“This is an irreversible window,” Singhvi said. “If they do not act promptly, it would be a complete abdication of constitutional duty.”

Ashok Lavasa, who was the election commissioner during the 2019 general elections, said the process from receipt of a complaint to its decision “should not take more than three to four days because otherwise it loses its purpose”, as the campaign phase is quite short.