Bengaluru: Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajeev Kumar said that the Election Commission of India (ECI) despite conducting 400 assembly elections, 17 general elections and 16 presidential and vice-presidential elections, gives a ‘fire test’ in every election. He was replying to a question regarding free and fair elections here on Saturday. He said that the ECI completed the milestone of conducting 400 assembly elections in the recently concluded elections in the three northeastern states of Tripura, Meghalaya and Nagaland.
CEC Kumar while answering the question whether the people of Karnataka can trust him to hold free and fair elections, said, “The Election Commission of India has recently completed the 400th State Assembly Elections in Tripura, Meghalaya and Nagaland. 17 elections to Parliament and 16 elections to the President and Vice President. Election after election results are accepted and the transfer of power has been smooth every time by ballot.”
The CEC said that in the last 70 years India has stabilized its social, cultural, political, geographical, economic, linguistic issues peacefully and through dialogue mainly due to democracy established which is possible only because people depend on election results. Let’s trust “Yet the ECI gives ‘trial by fire’ every time after every election,” he added.
The CEC was in Karnataka with his team on a three-day tour to examine the preparations for the upcoming assembly elections. The tenure of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly is till May 24, 2023. Therefore, there has to be a new assembly, and before that elections have to be held. Kumar said all senior citizens above the age of 80 and people with disabilities would get the vote-from-home option in the Karnataka assembly elections. For the record, in the 2018 assembly elections, BJP won 104 seats and emerged as the single largest party, while Congress and JD(S) secured 78 and 37 seats respectively.