Congress president's poll: 'Make electoral rolls public', chorus grows

New Delhi, August 31

The chorus to publish the electoral rolls for the upcoming election to the post of Congress president grew louder today with another G-23 leader Manish Tewari asking how the process could be fair unless the electoral rolls were publicly available.

Tewari found support in the demand to make the voter list public from MP colleagues Karti Chidambaram and Shashi Tharoor even as another Lok Sabha member of the Congress Manickam Tagore downplayed the controversy wondering why his “friends” were raking up the matter and creating confusion when “everything is clear and open”.

Tewari asked chairman of the Congress Central Election Authority Madhusudan Mistry how there could be a free-and-fair election without publicly available electoral rolls.

“The essence of a free-and-fair process is that the names and addresses of the electors must be published on the Congress website in a transparent way. How can someone consider running if he or she does not know who the electors are? If someone has to file a nomination and get it proposed by 10 Congress persons, as is the requirement, the election authority could reject the nomination, saying that the proposers are not valid electors,” Tewari said.

Supporting Tewari, Karti Chidambaram said reformists were not rebels and that “every election needs a well-defined and a clear electoral college, and the process of forming the electoral college must also be clear, well-defined and transparent.” An ad hoc electoral college is no electoral college, Karti said. Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, who is contemplating running for the post, also supported Tewari and Karti saying that it was important for everyone to have faith in the electoral rolls.