 "EC attacked: Jaitley, Chouhan question poll panel's action against Modi")
“When Constitutional institutions react in haste and even anger, they miss out the larger vision,” said Jaitley, leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha.
Chouhan, chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, went a step further by slamming the EC also for continuing to impose the code even after the voting process was over in his state. He accused the EC of being anti-development.
He tweeted on Thursday how Madhya Pradesh “since last September, barring a brief breather, suffers vexatious weight of Model Code of Conduct (and) will continue to suffer (for) 20 more days”. Madhya Pradesh saw Assembly elections in November 2013, followed by Lok Sabha polls and is slated to have civic elections.
Party spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman maintained the BJP respected the EC and would abide by all its directions. She said the party would reply to the EC’s notice to Modi in a few coming days.
According to party sources, Jaitley and Chouhan had criticised the EC in their personal capacities, with Jaitley having posted his views on his blog while Chouhan on his twitter handle and that this wasn’t BJP’s official position.
Jaitley, also a lawyer, vociferously defended Modi. He said it was nearly routine for media to throng senior politicians for comments after they cast their vote. “The politicians freely interact with the media. They make short comments and then leave. This is precisely what Narendra Modi did,” said Jaitley.
Jaitley questioned EC’s claim that Modi held the “public meeting” within the polling area. He said it wasn’t clear from the EC’s notice “what the definition of polling area is”.
He pointed out the instance of Amartya Sen, who spoke to the media after his vote on Wednesday in West Bengal, spelling out his reasons why he does not favour Modi. Similarly, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also spoke to the media after casting his vote in Assam. “So did most other political leaders. I am not pleading for their prosecution. I am only illustrating that an interpretation being given by the Election Commission may fall foul,” he noted.
The lawyer argued that Article 324 of the Constitution, that gives the EC its powers to conduct elections, is a reservoir of residuary jurisdiction. "It can't impact areas occupied by law. It cannot dilute the import and content of the right to free speech," he said.
Modi, speaking at a rally in Tirupati hours after the lodging of the FIR against him by Ahmedabad Police Crime Branch on Wednesday, had said that in his "entire life, not even a single FIR has been registered, not even for driving a scooter on the wrong side or for wrong parking. Suddenly today when I landed here I came to know that an FIR has been registered against me...I will never forget April 30."
His colleague, the Madhya Pradesh CM, launched a more direct attack on EC. Chouhan, in his tweets, said that Modi's action "by no stretch of imagination" can be termed campaigning or canvassing. He also questioned whether Modi actually addressed the media inside the polling booth area. "How do they (EC) measure the distance sitting in Delhi? Only with a mind unequal and oppressive," Chouhan tweeted.
He asked: "Can a spontaneous encircling of a VIP by the media be termed as press conference? Lexicon will die of exhaustion." Chouhan also questioned why "One is singled out for a violation done by all and sundry? Persons in similar circumstances are not receiving similar treatment, Umpireji." He said "selective prosecution is a violation of the constitutional guarantee of equal protection of law. It is a denial of justice."
The MP Chief Minster reserved sharpest of his criticism for EC's implementation of its poll code in the state nearly continuously since September, and even after the conclusion of voting in MP. The state's 29-seats voted for Lok Sabha on April 10, 17 and 24.
He said the poll code continued to be in force in Madhya Pradesh. In several tweets, Chouhan stated that "an overly formal and heavy-handed execution of MCC may be self-defeating. What justifies ban on issuing work tenders now? We are still being told not to call field officers even for development review purposes. Can you afford such a hard-nosed anti-growth bias? Even when the voting got over in my state, rigours of a stringent Code continues. Rigours that you do not see even in a developed country."
Chouhan said "democracy is for development and not at the cost of development. People cannot be asked to wait till this grand show is over." Madhya Pradesh is slated to hold municipal and panchayat elections where the poll code will be in force again.