SIMULTANEOUS POLLS: SP BACKS IDEA AS PARTIES REMAIN DIVIDED

NEWDELHI: Consensus eluded the Law Commission’s consultation with political parties on Sunday over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s proposal to hold simultaneous elections for the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, even as the Samajwadi Party backed the idea, citing frequent impositions of the model code of conduct.

While political parties such as the Trinamool Congress, Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Aam Aadmi Party have called the idea undemocratic and anti-federal, others opposed to it include the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Telugu Desam and Janata Dal (Secular), an official of the panel said on condition of anonymity. Apart from the SP, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi was the only other non-NDA party to come out in support of simultaneous polls, the official said.

The SP, represented by Ram Gopal Yadav, said the first simultaneous polls should be held in 2019, when the term of the 16th Lok Sabha comes to an end.

Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao said his party supported the idea, as months are spent preparing for polls through the year.

On Sunday, the second and penultimate day of the consultations, AAP lawmaker Ashish Khetan told the panel that simultaneous elections “will destroy our parliamentary democracy”.

Barring the Biju Janata Dal, whose representative and lawmaker Pinaki Misra will meet commission officials on Tuesday, all other parties that had agreed to join the consultation have finished meeting the panel’s team headed by chairman BS Chauhan. Misra said the BJD was a strong supporter of the idea. “It was originally Naveen Patnaik who mooted the idea. We are going to tell the commission, we are absolutely for it,” he said.

While submitting a draft working paper to the government on the issue on April 18, the commission had pointed out that political consensus would be key to the issue.

A panel member had said the changes needed in the law – including amending the Constitution and electoral laws of the country – could not be achieved in the absence of a consensus.