Clean chits to Narendra Modi and Amit Shah based on facts, not bias: CEC
Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora also said there are “times to remain quiet and times to speak up”, indicating that the issue could have been raised post elections.
INDIA Updated: May 30, 2019 08:10 IST
Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora Wednesday rejected criticism that the poll body gave clean chit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah on complaints related to Model code violations due to its “bias”.(ANI Photo)
Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora Wednesday rejected criticism that the poll body gave clean chit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah on complaints related to Model code violations due to its “bias”, saying it was decided on merit and disapproved fellow Commissioner Ashok Lavasa raising the issue of dissent in the middle of the poll exercise.
Arora also said there are “times to remain quiet and times to speak up”, indicating that the issue could have been raised post elections.
In an interview to PTI, the CEC said he is not a “moral judge of anybody, least of all somebody as senior as Lavasa”.
“Whatever may have been his misgivings or feelings, ultimately none of us can tell a lie to ourselves,” Arora said, while noting that all the members of the poll body are not supposed to be “photo copies” of each other.
Asked whether the controversy relating to Lavasa’s dissent was ‘avoidable’ during elections, Arora replied,”I did not start the controversy ... I had said that eloquence of silence is always difficult but far more desirable to see the election process through instead of creating ill-timed controversies.... and I stand by that.” He also reiterated that all the three members of EC are not expected to be template or clones of each other. “Whether it is this ECI or past ECIs, people are not photocopies of each other. But there are times for everything, time to speak, time to remain quiet,” he said.
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