Shashi Tharoor, a member of parliament representing the Congress party, put forward the position that Gyanesh Kumar — in his role as Chief Election Commissioner — holds protection from legal action under legislation passed in 2023. Tharoor indicated that Opposition lawmakers are drawing up impeachment articles targeting the Chief Election Commissioner and have called on him to step down, citing concerns over reported procedural irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.
Tharoor drew a distinction between the statutory safeguards that the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023 extends to the CEC and the constitutional footing that, in his view, the legislation leaves unaddressed. The legislation, he noted, cleared its final vote during the 2023 Winter Session — a period when Opposition members had already been removed from the chamber.
He stated that the constitutional provision allowing removal of Chief Election Commissioners on the same grounds as Supreme Court justices had prompted the Opposition to begin drafting impeachment articles.
Among the measures Tharoor put forward were a halt to the SIR process, reinstatement of voters whose names had been improperly removed, an audit of the software deployed during the revision, and a rollback of the amendments made to Forms 6 and 7. His objections extended to the removal of Jantar Mantar's designated protest status, with his position being that pushing demonstrators toward Ramlila Maidan, Burari Ground, and CBD Ground places physical distance between protesters and the officials they seek to reach.
Under the 2023 Act's Section 16, both sitting and past holders of the Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioner posts retain protection against civil or criminal proceedings tied to duties carried out in those roles, with actions unconnected to official conduct left outside that cover. A legal challenge to the provision is before the Supreme Court, which sent notices to the Centre and the Election Commission in January while allowing the clause to remain in operation.
Under Article 324(5) of the Constitution, removal of a Chief Election Commissioner follows the identical procedure and grounds that govern the removal of a Supreme Court judge. Under the existing framework, removing any Election Commissioner from office requires a formal recommendation from the Chief Election Commissioner before such action can proceed.
Tharoor raised concerns that the removal of voters from rolls was proceeding at a pace that outstripped the handling of appeals lodged against those deletions. He also put forward the assertion that officers have no way to fix errors in their records under the software currently in use, citing notices directed at Amartya Sen and other individuals as examples. He put forward a figure of 130 million deleted names.
Tharoor argued that the provision places on voters the responsibility of proving their eligibility, an arrangement he contended works against the fairness of the electoral process.
