EC holds NITI Ayog vice-chairman guilty of poll code violation

The Election Commission of India (ECI) has said the comments of NITI Aayog vice-chairman Rajiv Kumar on Rahul Gandhi’s Nyay announcement violated the model code of conduct. In a letter to Rajiv Kumar, the ECI said it found the reply furnished by him in response to a commission letter unsatisfactory. The ECI letter said the model code required all public servants to ensure the sanctity of the electoral process. “ …not to either engage in or appear to engage in any activity that disturbs or appears to disturb the level playing field of conduct of election,” the letter said.

The ECI said public servants should not only be impartial in their conduct but also in their public utterances. The communication said it was ‘conveying its displeasure’ and it ‘expected the officer to exercise caution in future.’

Rajiv Kumar had stated that the Congress president’s promise of Rs6000 per month to poor households was ‘true to its past record of promising the moon to win elections.’ “Congress president announces a scheme that will bust fiscal discipline, create strong incentives against work and which will never be implemented,” Kumar said in a tweet. “The cost of the #MinimumIncomeGuarantee scheme at 2% of GDP and 13% of the budget will ensure that real needs of people remain unsatisfied,” he said.

He had told the ECI that he spoke against Congress’s Nyay scheme as an economist and not as part of the policy body. In his reply to a show-cause notice by the ECI, Rajiv Kumar also said he could speak his mind as an economist on important issues concerning policy and economy. He said that his remarks should not be construed as the stand of the Niti Aayog.