Information on Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa’s dissent note could endanger life, says EC

Election Commission of India has given a strange response to an RTI application requesting for the opinion of Election Commissioners who were looking into Model code of conduct violation during General Election 2019, reported India Today.

At the time of General Election, when MCC was in force, EC had received many complaints over speeches by PM Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

EC consisting of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora, and Election Commissioners Sushil Chandra and Ashok Lavasa had given clean chits to PM Modi and Amit Shah.

Later, it was reported that Ashok Lavasa had expressed dissent over the clean chits by ECI to four speeches of PM Modi and one of Amit Shah. Lavasa had later asked ECI to make his dissent public.

Election Commission had refused to make the dissent public but said that it would be part of the record and thus could be obtained under Right to Information (RTI).

India Today sought the opinion of each of the election commissioners who had looked into the violations.

The RTI asked, "Please share the decision of the Election Commission on the provocative speeches made by political leaders in 2019 general election campaign when the MCC was applied".

"Please share notings of the opinion of CEC Sunil Arora election commissioner Sushil Chandra and election commissioner Ashok Lavasa on the speeches made by PM Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah," RTI also said.

Replying to this, ECI cited Rule 8(1)(g) of the RTI Act and said that the diclosure of the information will endanger the life of any person.

"The information sought cannot be disclosed under the Rule 8(1)(g) of the RTI Act, 2005, the disclosure which will endanger the life or physical safety of any person or identify. The source of information or support is given in confidence for law enforcement or security purposes,"