The Hindu : Elections not a priority now, says Cong.

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 23, 2002

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Elections not a priority now, says Cong.

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JULY 22. The Congress today urged the Election Commission to defer the elections to the Gujarat Assembly till peace and confidence were restored, and not to give in to the Bharatiya Janata Party's "fallacious'' interpretation of Article 174 (1) to justify early election.

A representation to this effect was made by a Congress delegation at a meeting with the Election Commission. Reiterating its demand for President's rule in Gujarat, the Congress cited Supreme Court judgments to say that the power to fix the date of an election was vested in the Election Commission, and it was not within the jurisdiction of the Centre or the State Governments.

The delegation comprised the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Manmohan Singh, Ambika Soni, political secretary to the party president, Sonia Gandhi, the Jammu and Kashmir Congress president, Gulam Nabi Azad, and the Rajya Sabha MPs, Kapil Sibal, H. R. Bhardwaj, and Oscar Fernandes.

Explaining the party position at a press conference later, the spokesman, Abhishek Singhvi, said that Article 174 (1) stipulated that the gap between two legislative sittings should not exceed six months. "This applies to two sessions of the same Assembly, and not between two sessions of separate Assemblies. Since the Assembly has been dissolved in Gujarat, this law cannot be applied.''

Maintaining that the Congress was not shying away from an election — after all, it had won all the elections in the recent past in the State, save the one from Rajkot — Mr. Singhvi said: "Elections are not a priority in Gujarat now. Much needs to be done for the restoration of peace and confidence.''

In arguing against the BJP's interpretation of Article 174 (1), the Congress position is that the Election Commission has been vested with a "vast reservoir of powers'' under Article 324 (that of superintendence, direction and control for the conduct of elections).

To an observation that the battle of wits and words over the election schedule for Gujarat revolved around "interpretations of Article 174 (1),'' Mr. Singhvi said, ``our interpretation harmonises Article 174 (1) and Article 324 whereas the BJP interpretation renders Article 324 superfluous.''

The Congress is also trying to force the Government into living up to the Rajya Sabha resolution — which it also endorsed — calling for the implementation of Article 355 (that of ensuring that the State Governments are carried on in accordance with the constitutional provisions) in Gujarat. Add to this the fact that "free and fair elections'' is the bedrock of an electoral process, and, in the opinion of the Congress, the situation in the State militates against this essential.

The party, however, fought shy of taking the same position on Jammu and Kashmir on the premise that this was one State where — because of cross-border terrorism — it preferred to be guided by Government inputs. Conceding that Mr. Azad had made such a demand, the Congress leader, S. Jaipal Reddy, said: "We are not opposed to it per se; but at the level of AICC we have not take a view on it and are awaiting a word on this from the Government.''

The Kashmir-specific demands that it placed before the Election Commission pertained to the "grey irregularities'' in the voters' list; allowing the Kashmiri pundits to vote through the electronic voting machines in their camps; and parity in security to the leaders of all the parties participating in the elections.

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