Gill strays off agenda again, regrets delay in women’s Bill

Gill reiterated that the formula suggested by the Commission — the parties themselves should allot one-third tickets for women at the time of elections — could provide a solution to the vexed issue. He conceded that it was up to the political parties to accept or reject it.

When this suggestion was first made, Gill’s interest in the issue had been criticised in some political circles who charged him of treading into a territory that was clearly not his.

Returning to the Commission’s agenda, Gill voiced concern over the tardy progress on the photo-identity cards programme in Tamil Nadu which is to have Assembly elections early next year along with West Bengal, Kerala, Assam and Pondicherry. The Centre, he said, had recently cleared a proposal for the purchase of 1.5 lakh more electronic voting machines costing Rs 150 crore for use in the coming Assembly polls.

The CEC said that future elections will be only on the basis of voter identity cards and through electronic voting machines. The Commission however had evolved various other modes through which a voter could exercise his franchise in the event of not getting a card on time.

Gill said the EC was seeking early resolution of two vexed issues in the Supreme Court on its jurisdiction over poll officials and the time of enforcement of the model code of conduct. On the dispute relating to the question of disciplinary control over poll officials, which remained unresolved for the last seven years, both the Commission and the Centre had filed a joint petition in the apex court, he said.

Meanwhile, the Election Commission today fixed September 29 as the date for giving its verdict on the Janata Dal symbol issue and gave a week’s time to Janata Dal (United) to submit whatever documents it wanted to give in writing.

The three-member panel, chaired by the CEC, heard representatives of both JD(U) headed by Civil Aviation Minister Sharad Yadav and JD (S) led by former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda in the dispute appeal filed by Gowda seeking the chakra as the symbol.

Arguing on behalf of JD(S), its counsel claimed that after Samata Party parted ways with JD(U) and the Lok Shakti was derecognised by the EC, and also in the light of reports that JD(U) leader and Communication Minister Ram Vilas Paswan proposed floating a new party, JD(S) had more MPs and hence it should be allowed to retain the chakra symbol.

However, JD(U) general secretary M. Raghupathy contended that Paswan was very much in the JD(U) and said that as long as he did not come before the EC to declare his new outfit, the EC should not take cognizance of newspaper reports about his plans to form a new party. He further claimed that it was the JD(U) which had more MPs.