Prime Minister Narendra Modi
Congress has filed 10 complaints against Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the Election Commission for alleged violation of Model Code of Conduct (MCC) and the party says it is the highest number of complaints faced by any Prime Minister in a Lok Sabha election.
The Election Commission has given a decision on six of these complaints so far, giving a clean chit to the Prime Minister in all the cases. Sources said in two of these cases the decision was not unanimous with one of the two election commissioners registering his verbal dissent with the matter having been decided according to the opinion of the majority.
The complaints, which cover a period from March 20 to April 30, relate to several speeches of Modi including those in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh. There is also a complaint about "illegal" roadshow in Gujarat on April 23.
On Saturday the poll panel gave Modi clean chit on compliant concerning his election speech at Patan in Gujarat on April 21.
Congress spokesperson Shobha Oza said Modi has made history in terms of complaints filed against him with the Election commission and no other prime minister from the time of Jawaharlal Nehru has "violated" the election norms in this manner.
"No other prime minister has shown this disregard to constitutional authorities whether it is CBI, RBI or Election Commission. That shows his mindset. A Prime Minister should lead by example, should be a role model. But here we have a person who is acting worse than a commoner. If he had fulfilled one of his promises, he would not have needed to do this," she said.
Varun K Chopra, an advocate representing the party before the commission, said the poll panel has taken decision in some cases. "For the remaining indecision is also a decision. Being watchdog of free and fair elections in the country, ECI should prudently exercise parity and level-playing field," he said.
He said only about 180 of 543 Lok Sabha seats are left to vote.
Congress President Rahul Gandhi had on Saturday morning accused the poll panel of being "biased" against the opposition and said that "capturing" of institutions will have a negative effect in the future.
"Where there are matters of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Election Commission is on a straight line and on the matters of the opposition, it is completely biased," he said.
He was responding to a question on the poll panel giving a clean chit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his Varanasi speech on armed forces and dubbing Congress as sinking Titanic ship in Maharashtra's Nanded.
"The style of functioning of Modi and the RSS is to hold the institutions. It is visible on the Supreme Court, Election Commission, Reserve Bank of India and everywhere else," Gandhi said.
The Supreme Court had on Thursday directed the Election Commission to decide on the remaining complaints made by the Congress against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah for allegedly making hate speeches or violating the Model Code of Conduct.
