A Supreme Court bench on Monday recused itself from hearing a petition filed by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) challenging Arun Goel’s appointment as Election Commissioner.
After hearing the case for a while, the bench of Justices KM Joseph and BV Nagarathna announced their intention to recuse themselves. The case has been remanded to another bench for further consideration.
Appearing for ADR, Advocate Prashant Bhushan stated that Goel’s appointment has been questioned in light of the observations made by a Constitution Bench in a recent judgment in which it directed reform of the process of appointing Election Commissioners. During the course of its investigation into that matter, the Constitution Bench examined the process of appointing Goel as EC.
According to the Constitution Bench, the process of appointing Goel as an Election Commissioner “raises certain pertinent questions.” It had taken note of the fact that Goel’s appointment was made with ‘lightning speed,’ and the entire process was completed in a single day.
During the hearing, Justice Nagarathan asked Bhushan, “You are requesting a writ of quo warranto.” But which rule is broken?”
He responded by claiming that the appointment was made arbitrarily and that the entire process was fraudulent.
Justice Nagarathna pointed out, “It might have been done in tearing hurry, undue haste as you say…but is that a ground for quo warranto? What is the violation of rule?”
Advocate Bhushan contended that Goel’s appointment violated Article 14 of the Constitution because the entire process was fraudulent and there was no reason to cherry-pick only certain names while excluding other qualified candidates.
According to Justice Joseph, “There was a system prevailing for appointment of Election Commissioners . You can’t just rely on our judgment…”
He added , “What we are concerned with more is the process of appointment under the law as it stood then. Can we think of what he will do in future?”
Justice Nagarathna expressed her concern that whether the appointment can be challenged when it was made in accordance with the existing rules. Advocate Bhushan argued that Goel’s appointment would also violate the principle of “institutional integrity”, which was invoked by the Supreme Court to quash the appointment of PJ Thomas as CVC head.
According to the petition, the Union of India stated in substantiating Goel’s appointment that because he was the youngest of the four people on the panel assembled, he would have the longest tenure in the ECI. The plea further claims that a deficient panel was purposefully formed to justify Goel’s appointment on the basis of age.
Furthermore, there were 160 officers from the 1985 batch, some of whom were younger than Goel. However, the Government appointed Goel without explaining why the officers who were younger in age than Goel and who would have a full tenure of six years as mandated by Section 4 of the Election Commission (Conditions of Service of Election Commissioners and Transaction of Business) Act, 1991 were not appointed.
