The deletion of nearly 13 crore names from the draft list as a result of the Special Intensive Revisions of electoral rolls under Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar has echoes of a controversy in Gujarat in 2002. The situation was similar, but the outcomes were different.
It was July 2002. Five months of sustained violence in the aftermath of the Godhra train burning in February that year had torn Gujarat apart. The post-Godhra attacks, largely on Muslims, had displaced thousands. Many had migrated from their homes and were living in relief camps.
In the middle of the mayhem, at 3 pm on July 19, Bharatiya Janata Party general secretary Arun Jaitley met with Chief Election Commissioner JM Lyngdoh. The situation in Gujarat is “normal”, Jaitley said, so why not hold early elections? If elections in Punjab and Assam could be held before normalcy had returned there, why not in Gujarat, he argued.
The chief election commissioner replied, “Gujarat is different because it is the case of a discredited government.” Jaitley accused him of using political language.
“Language of that kind is not a politician’s prerogative,” Lyngdoh countered. After all, there had to be an end to this sophistry, Lyngdoh writes in his book, Chronicle of an Impossible Election.
The Election Commission had refused...