Srinagar: Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti on Wednesday cautioned that India risks resembling a “banana republic” if the “fudging” of electoral rolls to suit the ruling BJP goes unchecked.
The PDP president was reacting to an Indian Express report that two Election Commissioners had objected to the Election Commission’s steps 14 times in 10 months amid the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voters list.
Officials said Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had flagged multiple issues, including deletion of names, in various states during the voter roll cleanup but the poll body was unanimous in its decisions related to the pan-India SIR.
“I feel that both our sibling nations — India and Pakistan — are trying to undo each other, competing with each other over who can cause more harm to their own people, to their country,” Mehbooba Mufti told reporters here, drawing parallels between the two neighbouring nations.
“Our country, India, which is seen as the largest democracy in the world, and which our prime minister proudly speaks of it as the ‘Mother of Democracy’ whenever he is abroad, (but) today, they are trying to subvert the very fundamentals of Indian democracy, which is the electoral process, by fudging the electoral rolls — something these two Election Commissioners have pointed out,” the former CM said.
Mufti said if the situation continues like that “where deletions and additions in the electoral rolls happen according to the wishes of the BJP, then there is a “danger” that at some point “our country, which is the largest democracy in the world, will come to resemble a banana republic”.
She asserted that the mass deletion of roughly 13 crore names from draft voter rolls across 30 states and Union Territories was a direct assault on the democratic process.
“That is what I say, if this continues, and if we do not have people like these two Election Commissioners… I will not name them right now. Who knows what trouble they might face – they might face ED raids, Income Tax raids, or worse. But if it continues like this, there will be a time when we will resemble a banana republic, and there will be no democracy left,” she added.
Mufti praised the two Election Commissioners, describing them as a silver lining.
“The only silver lining I see is that in India, we still have people like these two Election Commissioners who have the courage and integrity to question those in power. Unfortunately, in Pakistan, no such voices exist within the establishment who can question the arbitrary detention of Imran Khan’s sisters. It is a very sorry state of affairs,” she said.
The PDP president also criticised the Pakistan government over crushing domestic dissent while attempting to project itself internationally as a global peace mediator.
“Look at Pakistan, which goes around the world as a peacemaker and mediator of peace; it is crushing dissent within its country with an iron hand. Look at how they are detaining Imran Khan’s sisters, who were unarmed and protesting peacefully, just because they stood up for their brother. What does that say?
“You are going around the globe presenting yourself as a peacemaker, yet at home, you detain unarmed women,” she said.
