AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi, speaking on Monday, called for the legislation governing how Chief Election Commissioners and Election Commissioners are appointed to be struck down, directing his objections at the central government over the selection process it oversees. He argued that extending legal protection to those individuals would damage the institution's standing.
In an interview aired on a prominent television outlet, the Hyderabad MP said he had stood alongside then-MP Imtiaz Jaleel on the floor of the Lok Sabha to voice objections when the bill came up for debate. The concern he had raised at the time — that public confidence in the Election Commission would deteriorate — had, in his assessment, since materialised.
Owaisi raised the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023 as a point of contention, arguing that the legislation risked eroding public trust in the Election Commission. His party had formally placed that position on record in the Lok Sabha when the bill came up for consideration, ahead of its eventual assent.
The legislation included a clause extending legal protection from prosecution to anyone serving as Chief Election Commissioner or Election Commissioner, a shield that would persist even after they left office. Owaisi questioned how such an outcome had come about.
Raising the question of why election commissioners ought to hold legal protection, Owaisi pointed to past court proceedings involving former Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao and BJP veteran LK Advani as evidence that high-ranking political figures had not been shielded from the law.
The AIMIM leader raised objections to how the three-member selection panel was structured, contending that its composition gave an inherent advantage to the party in power. The panel comprises the Prime Minister, a Union Cabinet Minister of the Prime Minister's choosing, and the Leader of the Opposition. Owaisi posed a direct question about the process by which Election Commissioners were being appointed, arguing that the arrangement effectively guaranteed the installation of a preferred candidate. "Those concerns have since been borne out," he said.
Owaisi called for the reinstatement of the Chief Justice of India to the selection panel, alongside the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, and said the legislation governing the appointments process would need to be repealed entirely.
He also raised objections to the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls, calling for the process to be halted and questioning the grounds on which the exercise was being carried out. Approximately 100 million voter registrations have been removed from the rolls, and the Form 6 submission process now requires applicants to provide address-mapping details. Owaisi questioned how that requirement would function in practice, noting that no framework existed to accommodate it. He called for the SIR to be dissolved and for the laws underpinning it to be removed from the statute book.
Addressing the security arrangements and physical barriers erected across the capital ahead of planned demonstrations, Owaisi argued that citizens hold a constitutionally protected entitlement to gather and demonstrate, pointing to a Supreme Court ruling that had affirmed peaceful protest as a fundamental right. He characterised the way the matter had been handled as falling short at every stage, and said that travel restrictions within Delhi alone could not alter the convictions people held, nor did such restrictions fall within what he considered permissible.
When reporters asked Owaisi about the INDIA bloc's planned procession to the Supreme Court seeking the removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, he said he had no involvement in the event and would not be joining it. He stated that the programme belonged to others and that responsibility for carrying it out rested with them.
