On Monday, at a consultative meeting organised by civil society groups, participants expressed their worries about the purported failure of Election Commission in ensuring free and fair elections, ongoing violations of model code of conduct, excessive reliance on EVMs and possibilities of defying peoples’ mandate that some of them were listed among others.
A total number of civil society organisations from South India, political parties’ representatives and retired administrators along with social movements members discussed how the ruling establishment may respond to the outcome of 18th Lok Sabha elections conducted as early as possible.
Among other speakers including Parkala Prabhakara, Teesta Setalwad, Nadeem Khan, M.G. Devasahayam, Major General Vombatkere, Ravi Joshi and Ganesh Devy advocated for “recognizing this as an emergency in which un-Constitutional forces posed threats to realizing democracy.” They emphasized people’s responsibility to assert their rights and safe guard their electoral mandate.
This election was described as a contest between the people of India versus undemocratic forces thus discussions focused on what opposition parties need to do while preparing for these election results should the election results be met with resistance violence or denial for transfer power.
Therefore Noor Sridhar a representative from Wake-Up Karnataka distilled all the varied discussions into a summary statement that outlined five key responsibilities which could help citizens become stakeholders in these issues and ensure that there is no denial of politics will. These included constituting Citizens Vigilance Committees to oversee all counting processes; Petitioning Supreme Court to postpone court’s vacations immediately after announcement; Putting pressure on EC to follow code of conduct; Petitioning President India over peaceful transition.
“A letter would be written and addressed to all public administrators to abide by constitutional principles and uphold rule of law under all circumstances. All civil society organisations are therefore required take up this responsibility together with all concerned citizens so that we are ready for peaceful and powerful satyagraha across the country,” says a statement.
