New Delhi: The Centre’s amendment of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961 to restrict public inspection of CCTV footage of an election has caused an uproar, with the opposition Congress calling it “another assault” on the Election Commission of India’s integrity.
The amendment was passed in a bid to undo a Punjab and Haryana High Court order which directed the ECI to provide CCTV footage and other documents related to the 2024 Haryana elections to advocate Mehmood Pracha. In a judgment passed 9 December, the high court had directed these documents to be provided within 6 weeks of Pracha submitting an application and depositing the requisite charges.
A notification was then issued by the Ministry of Law and Justice on Friday, amending Rule 93(2)(a) of the Conduct of Elections Rules. The notification said that the amendment was being made after consulting with the ECI.
The pre-amended rule allowed the public inspection of “all other papers relating to the election”. However, the amendment now says that the public inspection will be limited to “all other papers as specified in these rules”.
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The amendment would effectively restrict access to electronic records and CCTV footage relating to an election.
Congress leader Jairam Ramesh called the amendment a vindication of the assertions on the “rapidly eroding integrity of the electoral process managed by the Election Commission of India”.
“Why is the ECI so afraid of transparency?” he asked in a post on ‘X’, asserting that this move of the poll panel will be challenged legally right away.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge also called the amendment “another assault in its (Modi government’s) systematic conspiracy to destroy the institutional integrity of the Election Commission of India”. He called the move an effort to stonewall electoral information, and said that the amendment was proof that ECI was not behaving independently.
However, an ECI official said that the candidate already has access to all documents and papers, and nothing has been amended in the rules in this regard. The official claimed that the rule has been amended to safeguard misuse of CCTV footage from inside the polling stations.
Defending the move, the ECI official said that the rule originally mentioned election papers and documents, which does not specifically refer to electronic records.
Therefore, the rule was amended in order to “remove this ambiguity, and considering the serious issue of violation of secrecy of vote and potential misuse of CCTV footage from inside the polling station using artificial intelligence by a single person”.
“Sharing of CCTV footage may have serious repercussions specially in sensitive areas like J&K, Naxal-affected regions, etc where secrecy is important. Lives of the voters may also be at risk. All election papers and documents are otherwise available for public inspection,” the ECI official added.
The official further clarified that in any case, candidates have access to all documents, papers and records. “Even Mr Pracha was entitled for all documents and records from his Constituency when he contested as a candidate in Lok Sabha Elections 2024,” he said.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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