NEW DELHI, May 5: Wisdom seems to have dawned at last. Caught in an avalanche of criticism over conducting polls amid the Covid pandemic in four states and a union territory, the Election Commission of India has postponed the next round — a handful of by-elections. Three Lok Sabha seats and eight seats in state assemblies were up for election in this round.
“The Commission has reviewed the matter today and has decided that due to the outbreak of the second wave of Covid-19 in the country it would not be appropriate to hold bye-elections till the pandemic situation improves and conditions become conducive…,” read a statement from the Commission on Wednesday.
The bypolls have been deferred by the ECI in the parliamentary constituencies of Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Khandwa in Madhya Pradesh and Mandi in Himachal Pradesh. Other than these, bypolls have also been postponed in eight assembly constituencies in various states and Union territories, including Kalka and Ellenabad in Haryana, Vallabhnagar in Rajasthan, Sindgi in Karnataka, Rajabala and Mawryngkneng in Meghalaya, Fatehpur in Himachal Pradesh and Badvel in Andhra Pradesh.
“Your officers should be booked on murder charges probably,” the judges had observed.
Furious that the media had carried the oral remarks, the Commission had gone to the Supreme Court, which yesterday said the Commission “should treat it as a bitter pill in the right spirit” in the larger public interest.
The Commission was hugely criticised as the massive eight-phase elections in Bengal rolled on as polls everywhere ended and the daily Covid surge across the country climbed to 3-lakh plus.
The Commission had denied not only requests from the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress to club the last three phases, but also bypassed the Calcutta High Court’s words of caution.
Last month, the wife of a Trinamool Congress candidate who died of Covid, filed a murder case against the Election Commission. Nandita Sinha — the wife of Kajal Sinha, who died on April 25 — accused Deputy Election Commissioner Sudeep Jain and other officials of “careless and negligent” behaviour that led to the death of her husband and several other candidates.
(Manas Dasgupta)
