The country needs a man like TN Seshan
For the last eight years, many questions were being raised not only in the opposition parties but also in the minds of every conscious citizen who believes in democracy regarding the working style of the Election Commission. The Supreme Court of India has made the Government of India uncomfortable by suddenly asking for the file on the appointment of Election Commissioner Arun Goyal. But its positive message has gone to the country. Commenting on the controversial role of the Election Commission, the Supreme Court has recalled TN Seshan, who was the Chief Election Commissioner of India from 1990-96, and said, “the country needs a man like TN Seshan”.
It is a coincidence that in the last few years, whoever became the Chief Election Commissioner or Election Commissioner has been my best friend. Taking advantage of this friendship, I warned him time and again that his image was not going to be the same as that of Seshan. He didn’t mind but didn’t do anything that would increase the trust of the opposition parties towards the commission. That is why the situation has come today that the Supreme Court had to comment on the Election Commission.
On asking for the file on the appointment of Arun Goyal, the government says that the Supreme Court has no right to do so. Let me remind you here that there was a time during his tenure when even TN Seshan had to bear the rebuke of the Supreme Court. He was very hurt that day. As usual, when I went to his residence at Pandra Road, Delhi, he wept for a few moments with his head on my shoulder. Because his ego was hurt. I consoled him and said that you are also on a constitutional post, so you should counter it. But his lawyers explained to him that the job of every pillar of democracy is to keep an eye on each other.
If any pillar becomes autocratic then democracy becomes weak. The matter ended there. It is necessary to mention this incident here because the comment made by the Supreme Court on the executive today or the file called for has a solid basis and therefore the government should cooperate with the court with full responsibility.
The Supreme Court made this remark during the ongoing hearing before the constitutional bench of several PILs pending since 2018. It has been demanded in these petitions that the members of the Election Commission should also be selected through the process of a collegium. During the debate, the chairperson of the bench, Justice Joseph, said why this selection cannot be in line with the Supreme Court’s ‘Vineet Narayan vs Union of India’ decision. So that the selection committee has three members, the Chief Justice of India, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha.
This demand is absolutely justified because the Election Commission deals with all the political parties of the country. If only the government selects its members, then obviously it will choose such officers who will follow its instructions. By the way, TN Seshan was also elected through the existing system. But then there was a minority government of Chandrashekhar in the center. Perhaps that is also why Seshan could do all that for election reforms, which might not have been possible for him if he had been elected by a single major party.
It is noteworthy that before TN Seshan, the common man did not even know the existence of the Election Commission. Seshan gave a very detailed shape to the Election Commission. Because in this historic effort of his, I and my colleague journalist Rajneesh Kapoor also had some role. So we are the witness to the time when Mr. Seshan did this unprecedented work. During those days, violence and booth capturing had become a common practice of the elections process. Suddenly the interference of goons and mafia in politics had started increasing. Due to which concern was being expressed in the whole country. To change this atmosphere, Mr. Seshan decided to bring about electoral reforms.
In fact, the government system does not allow any revolutionary work to be done easily, so Mr. Seshan established ‘Deshbhakt Trust’ as a ‘think tank’ to give shape to election reforms. Whose president he himself became and his wife Mrs. Jayalakshmi Seshan and I became the trustees. The registered office of this trust was the office of our ‘Kalchakra Samachar’ located in Delhi’s Hauz Khas. Intellectuals, owners of media groups, social workers, industrialists and senior officials from all over the country regularly used to come to our office to have serious discussions on these topics with Mr. Seshan.
Mr. Seshan and I used to go to every nook and corner of the country to wake up people via huge public meetings of ours about electoral reforms. This marathon effort had a great effect and a new and strong image of the Election Commission was created in the whole country. But the tough attitude of Mr. Seshan created panic in the political parties. When the Seshan was on a month-long stay in the US, the Narasimha Rao government increased the number of the EC members from one to three. These two new members were brought in to trim Seshan’s wings. Mr. Seshan called me from America and said, “Narasimha Rao has cheated me a lot. I am very hurt. What to do? You keep thinking that we are returning to India by next week.
Since I was also fighting for political purity in the country by exposing the Jain hawala scandal since 1993, on his arrival I suggested that we set up ‘People’s Election Commissions’ in every town, city and province across the country in which Eminent people of the area should be made members who have never had any connection with any political party.
These hundreds of election commissions were to be formed with the aim that they should keep an eye on every election in their area and try to bring morality in them. Mr. Seshan liked this suggestion very much and together we prepared its detailed manual and got thousands of its pamphlets printed and distributed all over the country. It had a good effect and ‘People’s Election Commissions’ also started being formed in different parts of the country. My suggestion was that after retirement, Seshan should become the Chief Election Commissioner of ‘People’s Election Commission’ so that election reforms can be given the form of a mass movement by taking advantage of his branding established in the country. But despite being hurt by Mr. Rao’s attitude, Seshan was not ready to resign.
Therefore, only limited success could be achieved in this direction. However, it is certain that he raised the image of the Election Commission of India to great heights and set the benchmark for future Election Commissions. That is why today even after 26 years, the Supreme Court has had to underline the importance of TN Seshan.
–Vineet Narayan
