Is India’s Election Commission Toothless? No. It Lacks a Spine.

The credibility of India’s Election Commission (EC) is on the line.

The Indian electoral watchdog is mandated to conduct free and fair elections, where all political parties are provided with a level playing field. However, the body’s performance in the ongoing 18th general election has raised serious questions about its neutrality.

It is not, for instance, taking action against politicians of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who violate the Model Code of Conduct, a set of guidelines the EC issues to regulate the conduct of parties and politicians during elections. BJP leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are openly flouting the code of conduct rules, but the EC is simply looking the other way.

On April 21, Modi said at an election rally in Banswara in Rajasthan that if the opposition was voted to power it would take away the “hard-earned money” of the people, even the mangalsutra (an auspicious gold chain that a groom ties around his bride’s neck at their wedding) of Hindu women, to distribute among “infiltrators” and “those who have more children.” This was an apparent reference to the Muslim community, which has been the main target of propaganda and violence by the BJP and its fraternal organizations.

Hindutva propaganda has long peddled the conspiracy theory that Muslims produce more children and will soon outnumber India’s Hindu population. Muslim migrants into India especially from Bangladesh are described as “infiltrators” but Hindu nationalist groups. Indeed, at election rallies in 2018, Amit Shah, India’s powerful home minister, described Muslim migrants as “termites” that should be thrown out of the country.

Opposition leaders across parties have slammed Modi for his “hate speech” and “divisive” remarks, and called on the EC to investigate if he has violated the Model Code of Conduct.

The Model Code of Conduct forbids parties and politicians from conducting their campaigns in a manner that incites hatred or causes tension between different religious or community groups.

Amid growing communal polarization and tension in the country over the past decade, Modi’s remarks, even if just “a jibe against the Congress,” could “perpetuate the stereotype of Muslims as a problem, and not an asset for India” and “even promote acts of violence” against them, Zeyad Masroor Khan, author of “City on Fire” told Al Jazeera.

Instead of swiftly acting to probe Modi’s remarks, the EC “declined to comment” on the matter.

That prompted thousands of Indians and citizens’ bodies to sign a petition demanding action from the election watchdog. “The EC’s failure to take any action against such hate speech will only undermine its credibility and autonomy that has been safeguarded and upheld by a series of exemplary officers before you,” the petition read.

All parties violate the election rules to different degrees. However, the EC, which has been quick to rap opposition parties on the knuckles, has treated the BJP with kid gloves. And in the absence of action from the EC, BJP leaders have continued to use abusive language against opposition candidates or use religion to draw votes.

Opposition politicians have accused the EC of acting as a subsidiary organization of the BJP.

The body was not always this incompetent. Indeed, the EC has played a stellar role in building India’s democracy. Set up in 1950, it had less than a year to prepare from scratch for the country’s first general election in 1951-52. One massive task was preparing electoral rolls. Millions displaced by the Partition riots were still homeless, and India had a massive, largely illiterate population. How would voters be able to read the names of candidates while making their choices? The EC came up with innovative solutions; it provided each party with a symbol. Despite skepticism in the West, India’s first election was a success. Since then, the EC has managed multiple elections to parliament, state assemblies, and local bodies.

Over the decades, the number of voters and polling booths has grown manifold. Paper ballots made way for electronic voting machines in 2002. A Model Code of Conduct was introduced and voters issued identity cards.

The EC deserves applause for braving bullets and boycott calls by militants. It works hard to make polling booths accessible to all Indians; its officials sometimes need to trek long distances on sandy or icy terrain, even riding on the back of elephants and camels to set up polling booths in remote villages in forests and deserts alike. This time election officials will personally visit the homes of those who have disabilities or are over the age of 80.

However, the EC’s stature has been declining over the decades on account of its growing reluctance to rebuke politicians, especially of the ruling party, for violation of the Model Code. A part of the reason is that governments of the day, whether led by the Congress or the BJP, have pushed loyalists into the EC. Navin Chawla, chief election commissioner in 2009-10, was said to be close to the Congress and the Nehru-Gandhi family.

In the past ten years, the EC’s decisions and actions have been clearly in favor of the BJP. For example, in cases when political parties split, with one faction joining with the BJP, the EC awarded the party name and symbol to that faction, even if it was the smaller of the two.

During the current campaign period, the EC has dealt with complaints by the BJP against opposition politicians with greater alacrity and seriousness than vice versa.

This partisan functioning of the EC does not come as a surprise. In December last year, the Modi government pushed through legislation to ensure that BJP loyalists would conduct the 2024 general elections. The election commissioners it appointed on March 15 were bureaucrats who had worked closely to implement key BJP policies. The election schedule was announced a day later, ensuring that the flawed appointments were a fait accompli.

Some have blamed the EC’s partisan discharge of its responsibilities on the lack of adequate powers. The EC is a toothless tiger, they say.

In an interview published in The Hindu, S.Y. Quraishi, the 17th chief election commissioner of India, said that “the EC has enough teeth” but it “probably needs a little more will power to act strongly, particularly against the ruling party, because the ruling party always has an advantage which has to be neutralized.” Quraishi pointed out that even “just polite advice to the prime minister is enough to cause ripples.”

What ails the EC, then, is not that it lacks teeth, but that it lacks a spine.