JOIN USEC sets up committee to suggest ways to get Covid-19 protocol enforced during polls
The Election Commission on Thursday set up a committee to study how it can make agencies responsible for enforcing Covid-19 safety protocols do their job more efficiently during polls “irrespective of and in addition to” its own guidelines.
The committee, which will be headed by the EC Secretary General, will also recommend measures needed to strengthen the legal and regulatory framework to enable the commission to ensure compliance of its guidelines and directions, including the Covid-19 safety protocols, more effectively during polls.
It will also identify shortcomings and gaps in the EC’s regulatory regime and the gaps in implementation and enforcement of the commission’s directions and guidelines at the level of the Chief Electoral Officers of states as well as local authorities in districts, a spokesperson of the poll-panel stated.
The EC decided to set up the committee after it drew flak for failing to enforce the Covid-19 safety protocols during the recent assembly polls in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Assam and Puducherry in March and April. The poll panel was also blamed for exacerbating the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in the country. The polling went on for several weeks in West Bengal, where the EC conducted voting in eight phases, even as the second wave of the pandemic wreaked havoc across the country.
The votes were counted in all the states and Puducherry on May 2.
The commission conducted the assembly elections in Bihar in October and November 2020, when the first wave of the pandemic had started to wane in several states across the country.
The EC had on August 21 last year issued a guideline for safely conducting polls at the time of the pandemic. It had stressed the implementation of its guidelines during recent polls, too. It was however criticized for failing to enforce norms like wearing masks and maintaining social distancing during campaigning by candidates and the political party they represented.
The Madras High Court on April 26 observed that the EC was “singularly responsible” for the second wave of the Covid-19 in the country as it failed to enforce safety protocols required to check the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus during electioneering. The court also observed that the EC officers should probably be booked for murder.
The EC, however, sought to pass the buck, by pointing out that the responsibility of enforcing the measures to contain the Covid-19 pandemic – like lockdown, restriction on or curtailment of public gatherings – had been assigned to the respective State Disaster Management Authorities (SDMAs). It alleged that SDMAs had not imposed public gatherings under the Disaster Management Act 2005 during the period when the assembly polls were held in the four states.
The commission stressed in a press release issued on April 27 that it had never taken over the SDMAs' task of enforcing the Covid-19 safety protocols.
The recommendations of the committee will help the commission to chalk out a way forward for forthcoming polls. The committee has been asked to submit its report within a month, a spokesperson of the EC said.