Kerala RS polls: After Govt nudge, EC broke 25-yr custom till HC stepped in

Just a day after the Union Law Ministry made its suggestion, the Election Commission reversed its personal order and went in opposition to a 25-year custom to droop elections to 3 Rajya Sabha seats from Kerala.
That controversial transfer was rejected by the Kerala High Court and the three members have been elected unopposed on April 23.
On March 17, the EC, then headed by Sunil Arora, introduced elections for April 12 to 3 Rajya Sabha seats representing Kerala – the incumbent members have been to retire April 21. Assembly elections in Kerala have been introduced February 26 and held on April 6.

On March 23, a day earlier than the Rajya Sabha elections have been set to be notified, the Union Law Ministry wrote to the EC that since voting in Kerala would finish April 6, holding Rajya Sabha elections on April 12 (earlier than the outcomes on May 2) “may not reflect the will of the people.”
Elections to the Upper House are oblique and MLAs of states elect these MPs. As per norms, the sitting Assembly doesn’t expire till a brand new one is elected. In reality, this has all the time guided EC’s determination on dates prior to now.
For instance, method again in 1996, the EC held elections to Rajya Sabha seats from Assam, Haryana, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal on time, though a brand new Assembly would have been elected quickly in every of those states.
The EC, beneath then Chief Election Commissioner T N Seshan, stated it was “incumbent” upon it to carry Rajya Sabha elections on time so long as a validly constituted electoral faculty (learn Assembly) was in existence.
In different phrases, elections to the Rajya Sabha needed to be performed earlier than the retirement of the sitting members so long as the present Assembly was nonetheless in place.

This precedent has not been violated since, exhibits an evaluation of Rajya Sabha polls held for roughly 150 seats from 2001 to 2020 in states the place these elections have been due the identical 12 months as Assembly elections.
Of these, phrases of at the least 24 sitting members from West Bengal ( in 2006), Andhra Pradesh (2014), Odisha (2014), Assam (2016), Kerala (2016), and Karnataka (2018) have been on account of finish inside roughly two months of the state Assembly’s expiration.
However, all Rajya Sabha elections have been held on time, and new Upper House MPs have been in workplace a day after retirement of the sitting members.
Going by this file, in Kerala, the Assembly remains to be in existence and so the Rajya Sabha elections ought to have been held earlier than April 21.
Asked why the EC didn’t comply with this precedent, an EC spokesperson stated that one mustn’t examine the Kerala Rajya Sabha polls with what occurred in 1996 because the Commission’s determination to maintain the Rajya Sabha polls in abeyance this time got here earlier than the formal notification of the elections.
But that is anyhow established process because the notification routinely follows announcement.
The spokesperson additionally stated the Commission needed to legally look at the “specific facts” highlighted by the Law Ministry since “that specific aspect was not covered by the precedent factual matrix.” By “specific aspect” the EC right here is referring to the truth that Kerala had completed voting and was awaiting the outcomes of the state election earlier than the date of the Rajya Sabha polls.
While that is true that the retirement date of the Rajya Sabha MPs was after Assembly elections have been introduced and earlier than the outcomes, norms say the Assembly has not expired.

“The notification for the Rajya Sabha elections is issued u/s 12 of the RP Act, 1951. And the EC always maintained that it would notify elections in conformity with the extant legal provisions. Consistently, this position was placed before the Hon’ble High Court, Kerala,” the EC spokesperson stated in her reply.
Kerala Legislative Assembly Secretary S Sharma, a CPM MLA, had challenged the EC’s determination within the High Court. On April 12, the Kerala HC ordered EC to carry the elections earlier than the time period of the current Assembly is over (that’s earlier than May 2). Following the court docket’s instructions, EC introduced that voting and counting for the three seats might be completed on April 30.
On April 23, Indian Muslim League chief PV Abdul Wahab and CPM leaders Kairali TV MD John Brittas and V Sivadasan have been elected unopposed to the three seats vacated by Vayalar Ravi (Congress), Ok Ok Ragesh (CPM) and Wahab on April 21.