President Droupadi Murmu on Thursday appointed retired bureaucrats, Gyanesh Kumar and Dr. Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, new Election Commissioners, the Ministry of Law and Justice said in a gazette notification.
“In exercise of powers conferred by section 4 of the Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023 (Act No. 49 of 2023), the President is pleased to appoint Shri Gyanesh Kumar, IAS(Retd.) and Dr. Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, IAS(Retd.) as Election Commissioners in the Election Commission of India, with effect from the date they assume charge of their office,” the notification said.
The selection of the Election Commissioners comes five days after the resignation of Election Commissioner Arun Goel.
Earlier in the day, Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury disclosed to mediapersons that a three-member committee, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has picked retired IAS officers Gyanesh Kumar and Dr. Sukhbir Singh Sandhu as the new Election Commissioners.
The sole Opposition member on the panel to select Election Commissioners, Chowdhury, after attending the meeting at the Prime Minister’s residence, said, “One Mr Gyanesh Kumar from Kerala and one Dr. Sukhbir Singh Sandhu have been selected as Election Commissioners.”
The selection panel, chaired by the PM, has a Union minister and Leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha Chowdhury, as its members.
Gyanesh Kumar is a 1988 batch IAS officer of Kerala cadre while Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, also from the 1988 batch, is from the Uttarakhand cadre.
Sandhu previously served as the Chief Secretary of Uttarakhand in 2021, and later held the position of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) Chairperson.
Kumar served as the Secretary of the Parliamentary Affairs Ministry. He played a pivotal role in establishing the Shri Ram Teerth Trust. Additionally, he led the J&K desk at the Home Ministry in 2019 during the abrogation of Article 370. He retired as Secretary from the Ministry of Cooperation.
Based on the recommendation of the selection committee, the President appointed the two members of the poll panel.
Two vacancies of election commissioners arose following the resignation of Arun Goel on March 8 and Anup Chandra Pandey’s retirement earlier on February 14. This left Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar as the sole member of the poll authority.
Chowdhury expressed reservations about the absence of the Chief Justice of India from the selection committee and noted a lack of transparency in the narrowing down of over 200 candidates to just six by the search committee led by the Law Minister.
”I asked for the short list of the candidates and they provided a list of 212 candidates yesterday evening and today morning was the meeting time, they did not even give time to go through all the candidates… It was impossible for me to know about the background of people,” he said, adding that ten minutes before the appointment they again gave him only six names.
”I didn’t agree with the procedure of selecting the election commissioners. I have submitted my dissent note there…. In this committee, the government already has the majority in the selection team. From the government side, two members and from the opposition side, only one member in the team, then what was the use of the meeting,” he expressed his displeasure.