“Unauthorised and Illegal”: Two Election Commissioners Just Exposed Their Own Boss

NEW DELHI: An Indian Express investigation published on Wednesday has triggered a political storm after it reported that two of the three Election Commissioners formally objected, on record, at least 14 times over 10 months to decisions taken in the name of the Election Commission of India during the nationwide Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

The report, by Ritika Chopra, said Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi flagged steps they described as “unauthorised and illegal,” including changes to new-voter Form 6, centralisation of the voter database in Delhi, filing of appeals in West Bengal, and the integrity of the software that maintains electoral rolls. Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar heads the three-member body. The SIR exercise has already seen more than 13 crore names drop off draft rolls across dozens of states and Union Territories, a figure the Opposition has long called systematic disenfranchisement.

What the investigation found

According to the newspaper, Sandhu and Joshi recorded objections on new voter registration, deletions and restorations, appeals against inclusions, and custody of the electoral-roll system. Some notes were copied to Kumar and to deputy election commissioners. In several instances the two commissioners asked the institution they themselves head who had authorised actions taken in the Commission’s name.

On Form 6, used for first-time registration, Joshi warned in May that the form could not be altered to force applicants to say whether they or their parents or grandparents “exist” in the last SIR roll without a change in the Registration of Electors Rules. The change went ahead. Sandhu later called it “unauthorised and illegal” and said it “must be removed immediately.” Applicants could not complete the form without answering the new question.

In West Bengal, after judicial officers included certain voters, 16.10 lakh appeals seeking their deletion were filed. Sandhu asked ECI officials: “Who was authorised to file these appeals on behalf of ECI, and by whom?” and “Who actually filed these appeals on behalf of ECI?” He said neither he, Joshi, nor the state’s Chief Electoral Officer had been informed.

Joshi warned of “gradual centralisation of the electoral roll database” and sought an audit so that “no one, except the concerned statutory authorities, has credentials to make any change.” Sandhu later wrote that state Electoral Registration Officers did not have “proper and complete access” to the portal and that the Director General of IT lacked legal authority to restrict statutory officers. In Goa, 97 voters cleared after Supreme Court-mandated hearings were still missing from the final roll because the software could not roll back deletions; multiple letters from the state CEO went unanswered.

The two commissioners also wrote separately to Cabinet Secretary T.V. Somanathan after a work-allocation order further concentrated IT control in Delhi. The full three-member Commission did not meet for four months, from May to early September.

LOP and INDIA bloc react

Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi renewed his “vote chori” charge. “Vote chori is a crime against the Indian people and a direct attack on our Constitution. The BJP, RSS and EC who organised it have committed an act of treason. Justice will be served,” he posted. In a video he addressed election officials: “What you are doing is wrong. This is treason, it is against the nation. Do not forget this. The time will come! We will catch you! You will not be spared.”

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said the party’s questions, once dismissed, had now come from inside the Commission itself. He pointed to alleged misuse of Form 6 and software, opaque decisions, and the removal of 13.8 crore names in the first three SIR phases across 31 states and Union Territories. He asked whether the pending Rajya Sabha notice of April 24, 2026, signed by 73 Opposition MPs seeking Kumar’s removal, would now be taken up.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra called the reported internal process “treachery with the nation” and “an act of treason,” demanding that those responsible be investigated by an impartial authority. She said her brother had been raising the same concerns for months and that the two commissioners had now placed them on record before Kumar.

Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav said the facts, if correct, meant commissioners could not perform their duties. “If the members of an independent body do not have the freedom to carry out just actions or if there is no hearing of theirs, then these are extremely fatal and dangerous circumstances for democracy. For some people to betray democracy by becoming puppets of those in power is a grave constitutional crime.” He asked the Supreme Court to take suo motu cognisance. He also alleged systematic deletion of SP voters with no action after complaints.

Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray demanded that Kumar be “immediately sacked and jailed.” He thanked Sandhu and Joshi for “exposing” the CEC and said the issue was “not an issue of one party. This is an issue of democracy.” He called for cancellation of “wrong decisions,” a probe, and fresh polls with ballot papers in Maharashtra, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. Sanjay Raut said the two commissioners had “torn the mask off Gyanesh Kumar.”

TMC MP Derek O’Brien said a motion already signed by more than 60 Rajya Sabha MPs should now be taken up: “Impeach CEC to save democracy.” Abhishek Banerjee demanded Kumar’s immediate removal and a court-monitored investigation, saying disenfranchising lakhs of voters “strikes at the very foundation of our democracy.”

P. Chidambaram said the Opposition had already argued that many SIR decisions were wrong; the report now showed the decision-making process itself was flawed. “If two ECs have taken a contrary view, how could the CEC make his view the ‘decision’ of the ECI?” He asked that recent ECI decisions be reviewed by a parliamentary committee and that SIR be suspended nationwide. Manish Tewari spoke of an “invisible hand” running the Commission and said decisions that were neither unanimous nor by majority would be “arbitrary and capricious if not completely illegal.” CPI(M) MP John Brittas said Parliament must start the removal process.

The Congress party posted that “Modi has captured the Election Commission. Gyanesh Kumar is Modi’s puppet” and that Kumar was “ruling like a dictator just like his boss Modi.”

Election Commission’s reply

The ECI did not dispute the existence, dates or contents of the 14 notes. In an official statement it called written notes, observations and technical suggestions “a normal part of deliberation in any institution” and “part of the decision-making process before a final decision is taken.” It said highlighting selected internal notes over 10 months while ignoring “the much larger body of approvals, decisions, instructions and initiatives” gave “only one part of the picture.” All decisions of the past year, including SIR and about 40 new initiatives, were “an outcome of the unanimous decisions of the full Commission,” the statement said. Sources separately insisted every final order carried the approval of all three members.

Opposition leaders dismissed the reply as inadequate, noting that it did not name who changed Form 6, who filed the Bengal appeals, or why the full Commission did not meet for four months.

The investigation and the reactions have reopened the larger contest over SIR, EVMs versus ballot papers, and the independence of the Election Commission—questions the INDIA bloc has pressed for more than a year and that two sitting commissioners have now put on the official record.