Terms of Reference for Electoral Committee

Mumbai University Press, 2021

The election commission is one of the permanent body of the Indian constitution. This is the autonomous and quasi-judicial constitutional body under Article 324 in part 15 of the constitution of India. This commission is the grand body vested in powers of supervision, control, and direction over all factors of electoral governance in the country. In 1950 it was established with the primary goal of managing and controlling and responsible for conducting free and fair elections of parliament, state legislature, the office of the president of India and the office of the vice-president of India

2019

One of the most important features of the democratic polity is elections at regular intervals. Elections constitute the signpost of the democracy; these are medium through which the attitudes, values and beliefs of the people towards their political environment reflected. Elections are the central democratic procedure for selecting and controlling leaders. Elections grant people a government and the government has constitutional right to govern those who elect it. Elections symbolize the sovereignty of the people and provide legitimacy to the authority of the government. Thus, free & fair elections are indispensable for the success of the democracy. In order to ensure free & fair elections the Constitution establishes the Election Commission. In January 25, 1950, the Election Commission has established in India. The secretariat of the Commission has 300 officials, and is located in New Delhi.This is a body autonomous in character and insulated from political pressures and executive ...

Computer Graphics Forum, 1984

Elections of new members for the EUROGRAPH-ICS Executive Committee. This year there are 7 vacancies and I5 candidates. 1. Procedure The procedure for voting in the Executive Committee elections will be described with the ballot forms which will be sent out in May.

Public Administration Review, 2008

Journal of African elections, 2006

Free, fair and transparent elections are fundamental to democracy. Citizens need to be assured that the politicians truly reflect the will of the people. The bodies charged with overseeing the election process must be impartial and independent, transparent and accountable. Botswana's Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has overseen two elections since its formation in 1997 and overall has been judged to have carried out its duties competently and fairly. The elections have been free of disputes, contributing to the widely held belief that Botswana is a stable democracy. The IEC is to be applauded for undertaking self-evaluations with stakeholders following each election in order to improve its performance. However, the structure and funding of the IEC leave it open to the charge that it is not truly independent of government and this has led to allegations, particularly by the opposition, that it may be biased. These perceived threats to independence should be addressed in the interests of transparency and to reassure the voters and avoid messy contestation of election results. It is recommended that the IEC should be responsible to Parliament and not to the Office of the President. It should be adequately funded to enable it to perform its tasks and obligations under the Constitution and the Act. The chief executive officer of the IEC should be appointed by the IEC itself in order to guarantee loyalty.

Who is responsible for managing elections? What are election management bodies? Are there different types of election management bodies? Are the election management bodies working independently or as part of the government? Do election management bodies perform permanent or temporary tasks? These questions along with many others may outline the focus of the second part of this chapter. The coming pages will give detailed analysis regarding the definition of election management bodies and the classification of the major types of them.

2019

As the constitutional body that conducts elections, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has emerged as a trusted institution within the shared space of democracy in India. This process has, however, been a fraught one because of contestation over the ECI’s constitutional responsibility and the power of Parliament to make laws to govern electoral matters. This comprehensive monograph discusses the history of the ECI through a study of the measures it has adopted to ensure certainty of procedures in order to maintain the democratic uncertainty of electoral outcome. In this context, innovations such as the Model Code of Conduct have enhanced the rule-making powers of the ECI. Going beyond the ECI’s design and performance framework, Singh and Roy argue that changes in the nature of electoral contests and domination of political regimes have made the task of preserving electoral integrity and assuring its deliberative content a challenging one.

“Independence” has been defined by Black’s Law Dictionary as the state or quality of being independent especially a country’s freedom to manage all its affairs, whether external or internal, without control by other countries. The word “Judiciary” has been defined as the system of court of justice in a country. The department of Government charged or concerned with the administration of justice, the judges, taken collectively, as, the liberties of the people are secured by a wise and independent Judiciary. The term in its current use, is used in describing the method of selecting judges in a state or country; as an adjective, of appertaining to the administration of justice or the court”.

Democracy is one of the universal and indivisible core values and principles to develop an inclusive society. In any democratic state, the will of the people is the basic requisite to derive the authority of the government. It requires free and fair elections in a way that the sanctity of the ballot be never compromised. To ensure the credibility and impartiality of the elections, states adopt a coherent and comprehensive policy to develop a mechanism to conduct the elections in a free and transparent manner under an impartial and empowered Electoral management body. The history of the Pakistan is rich with numerous incidents, including the sacking of elected governments through unconstitutional avenues,explicitly or implicitly under GHQ and the legitimization these moves through apex courts and fraudulent referendum. These frequent interventions fuel up the institutional decay and increase the trust deficit between the institutions and the people of Pakistan. Moreover, the democratic culture could not be internalized and institutionalized and also impeded Election Commission of Pakistan in its transformation as a strong national institution. Resultantly, each and every election met a lot of hue and cry and the credibility and authenticity of the elections used to remain at stake. An endless wrangling of allegations and counter allegations provokes, which poisons the polity of the state. There has been a persistent demand to establish an impartial election management body which used to maintain the sanctity of the ballot and will of the people in true letter and spirit. The study will encircle the power and structure of the Election Commission of Pakistan after eighteenth constitutional amendment and how it has succeeded to fulfill the demands and expectations of the stakeholders. The study will also compare the powers, structure, and credibility of the election management body of Pakistan to other regional states and how the loopholes, if any, can be addressed in political and constitutional manner.  Keywords: election management body, democracy, elections, rule of law In the contemporary world, democracy is considered one of the most important vehicles to develop an inclusive society. Elected governments derive their authority to rule from the will of the people which is expressed in free, fair, transparent and credible elections. States develop a cohesive and comprehensive mechanism to provide people conducive atmosphere to elect their representatives at stipulated constitutional time slots. The whole electioneering cycle engages a host of stakeholders to maintain the sanctity of the ballot. Out of them, election management body plays a key role to complete the election cycle in free, fair, transparent and credible manner.