New Delhi: A day before the Prime Minister-led panel met Thursday to choose two election commissioners, a fake gazette notification about appointment of two retired IAS officers to the poll body went viral on social media, prompting the government to issue a denial.
Comprising one Chief Election Commissioner and two Election Commissioners, the poll panel currently is functioning with just CEC Rajiv Kumar. While Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey retired on 14 February, Arun Goel resigned from his post last week citing “personal reasons”. Goel’s tenure was till December 2027.
The purported notification, dated 13th March, said that the three-member panel had appointed retired IAS officers — Rajesh Kumar Gupta and Priyansh Sharma — as election commissioners.
“Both Gupta and Sharma will assume office effective 13th March 2024. The President of Bharat has also granted his assent to these appointments,” read the notification purportedly issued by the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.
The Press Information Bureau (PIB) tweeted to alert the people at large, saying no such gazette notification was issued.
A notification regarding the appointment of two Election Commissioners to the Election Commission of India is circulating on social media #PIBFactCheck
✔️This notification is #fake
✔️No such Gazette notification has been issued. pic.twitter.com/VUCgl4l8wS
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) March 13, 2024
ThePrint found that there was no record of any IAS officer by the name of Priyansh Sharma in the Department of Personnel and Training’s (DoPT) executive sheet.
While there is a 1990-batch officer by the name of Rajesh Kumar Gupta, except the basic profile, there are no details of his postings over the years. The Uttar Pradesh-born bureaucrat is from the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre, according to the DoPT website.
PM Modi held discussions Thursday with Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and a Union minister to choose candidates for two vacant posts on the top panel of the Election Commission of India.
The current situation of only one member is concerning as the poll panel is expected to announce the dates for the Lok Sabha polls soon. Several states, including Maharashtra, Haryana, Odisha, and Andhra Pradesh, are going to election this year as well.
Addressing a press conference Wednesday in Jammu where he was asked about appointment of the two ECs, CEC Kumar said: “It is an issue between appointed and appointee. I am neither an appointee nor appointed. But yes it (appointment) should come in time”.
The CEC’s visit to Jammu and Kashmir, which concluded Wednesday, was the last in a series of visits to various states ahead of announcing poll dates.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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