Hail Gopalaswami and Ramseshan—Karnataka set for Polls | A. Jayaram

Published on 27-03-2008 In National

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Hail Gopalaswami and Ramseshan—Karnataka set for Polls

The Election Commission of India, the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer for Karnataka and the State administration are the "victors" even before the Assembly elections are held in the State and not any of the major political parties, the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Congress or the Janata Dal (Secular).

The main credit for the decision of the Election Commission to hold the elections before the expiry of the President's rule on May 28 should go in particular to the Chief Election Commissioner N.Gopalaswami. No doubt as the election campaign hots up, the BJP might claim the credit for the Election Commission's decision.

Gopalaswami has already made the people forget the much talked of former CEC T.N.Seshan. Unlike the latter, Gopalaswami talks gently without hurting anyone but acts with firmness .The former Union Home Secretary, has had his problems in the Commission with one of the commissioners Navin Chawla disagreeing with him at times. Even this time Chawla wanted elections in Karnataka to be postponed. Unlike Seshan, the present CEC has not questioned the authority of his two colleagues, the two commissioners (Chawla and S.Y.Quereshi). People in the know of things recall that the Supreme Court had to intervene to make the law clear on the powers of the two commissioners .The judgment went against Seshan and in favour of the former commissioners M.S.Gill and G.V.G.Krishnamurthy.

On the other hand, the clear loser even before the elections are held is the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee which wanted the elections held in October 2008. Its leaders had thought that as the Congress is heading the UPA Government at the Centre, the EC could be persuaded to toe its line. The State Congress had calculated that the delimitation of constituencies and the complaint of presence of bogus voters in the electoral rolls, would force the postponement of elections.

It was another Seshan, the low profile State Chief Electoral Officer Ramseshan who should be commended for making early elections possible. The low profile officer went about the twin jobs of delimitation of constituencies and revision of electoral rolls with professionalism .It is a pity he has decided to quit the IAS. He had displayed his steely resolve while taming the State's once powerful liquor lobby as the first managing director of the Karnataka Beverages Corporation. The State's excise revenue has gone up without increasing the duties. We need more number of Ramseshans in the government rather than Seshans. T.N.Seshan spoiled his record book by contesting against L.K.Advani as the Congress candidate from Gandhinagar in a Lok Sabha election.

The Congress and even the people at large had never expected the bureaucracy in the State to act with such speed in the matter of delimitation of constituencies and revision of electoral rolls. During its last visit to the State, the EC was reported to have expressed its unhappiness over the revision and found fault with the administration of some of the districts. Using the "Cut and Paste" method, some of the districts have been able to complete the delimitation work in just three days. Few had expected the ever slow administration to be so efficient. No doubt computerization has helped the work.

For long some of the IAS officers had treated the post of Chief Electoral Officer as a punishment posting. The Office used to become alive only during election time .

One might recall that in recent months, the State Election Commissioner (for Panchayats) M.R.Hegde ignored protests from the then JD (S)-BJP government and ordered elections to the local bodies. The creation of the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagarapalike (BBMP) through a cartographic aggression (inclusion of some of town municipalities in the Bangalore map) came in the way of holding civic elections in the State capital.

It is a good augury that the election authorities at all levels are asserting their independence and powers and not submitting meekly to the government.

Everyone knows why the Congress was opposing early elections. It wanted the people to forget the wrong or the injustice done to the Bharatiya Janata Party whose government survived for only eight days. By and large the people of the State are for early elections, though not out of sympathy for the BJP, outrage against the Janata Dal (Secular) or disenchantment with the Congress. It appears that the popular mood in the State is for ending President's rule. Though the Governor Rameshwar Thakur is exercising complete authority- taking major decisions, holding his durbars from the Vidhana Soudha from the chamber meant for the chief minister, holding Janata darshans and transferring officials-he has somehow failed to become popular. That is so despite Thakur having seasoned administrators as his advisers- P.P.Prabhu, S.Krishna Kumar and P.K.H.Tharakan.

Only the result of the elections would reveal the mind of the electorate- is it angry with H.D.Deve Gowda and his party for backstabbing the BJP, does it find the BJP to be foolhardy and gullible to have believed in the words of the JD (S) leaders and does it consider the Congress as the only party which can give a stable administration.

About the Congress party's questioning the correctness of the electoral rolls, one might ask whether the rolls prepared for any of the elections held since 1952 were fair. In the elections held in the last two decades, it was routine to find on the day of the elections, large scale deletion of names from the electoral rolls. It happened in 1996 when T.N.Seshan was at the helm of affairs. Bogus voting was taking place in particular voting booths. Many of those with voter's identity card had to return home dejected as their names were not on the rolls. This time the Congress had the support of only the Bahujan Samaj Party in demanding postponement of elections.

One has to comment on the indifference of even the educated voters in getting their names registered as voters or getting them deleted if they shifted their residence. Most of them turned a deaf ear to repeated appeals from the election authorities. But this time the Chief Electoral Officer's office sent enumerators more than once to each household to check the lists. That was a laudable job indeed.

As the dates for the elections are yet to be announced, it is too early to guess which political party will capture the Vidhana Soudha. With the collapse of two coalition governments and one single party government in the last 46 months, it is a replica of the situation as it existed in May 2004, with every one of the three major parties going to the polls with bitterness against the other two. But the people expect a stable government which can take the State forward and keep the Chief Electoral Officer's office idle for five years.

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