Plea in SC seeks to restrain Centre from appointing Election Commissioner

NEW DELHI — A plea has been filed in the Supreme Court to retrain the Union government to not fill the recently arisen vacancy in the Election Commission in accordance with the legislation which excludes the Chief Justice of India from the process of appointment of the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and other Election Commissioners (ECs).

It may be recalled that Election Commissioner Arun Goel resigned from his post on March 9.

The application seeks directions to immediately appoint the member of the poll body as per the March 2023 Constitution Bench judgment of the apex court requiring the appointment of top officials of Election Commission to be done by President on the advice of a panel comprising Prime Minister, Leader of Opposition (LoP) and Chief Justice of India.

An application seeking above directions has been filed by Congress leader Jaya Thakur in her PIL challenging the validity of the Chief Election Commissioner and the other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Condition of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023.

Several PILs were filed before the Supreme Court against the gazette notification issued by the Union Ministry of Law and Justice providing that the CEC and the ECs will be appointed by the President of India on the recommendation of a Selection Committee consisting of the Prime Minister, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha and a Union Cabinet Minister to be nominated by the Prime Minister.

A bench presided over by Justice Sanjiv Khanna in January this year had issued notice to the Union government and others in the matter but did not pass any interim order staying the implementation of the recent legislation by Parliament.

“There will not be a stay. We cannot stay a statute like this,” had said the Bench, also comprising Justice Dipankar Datta.