Opposition slams PMO's 'informal' meeting with poll panel

Congress says 'summoning' calls into question the poll panel's autonomy

Members of the Opposition slammed the central government over the "summoning" of the Election Commission for a meeting in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), alleging that the poll authority had become a "subservient tool" of the government. 

Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sushil Chandra and fellow commissioners Rajiv Kumar and Anoop Chandra Pandey recently held “informal interaction” with the PMO to bridge gaps in understanding of key electoral reforms between the poll panel and the law ministry.

CEC Chandra reportedly had reservations on a note from a Law Ministry official. The note reportedly said that the prime minister’s Principal Secretary P K Mishra