Reuters · Protests intensify in India over demands for the election chief to quit
The allegations against India's Election Commission are serious, both because the number of voters allegedly deleted from the rolls is staggering and because the process was opaque, with no transparency or oversight.
The controversy threatens the one label, democracy, that has long served as a fig leaf over charges of corruption, mismanagement, nepotism and ineffectiveness. The election chief's resignation will not be enough to restore it.
The government would be wise to open the whole process, including the criteria for verifying voter eligibility, to an independent audit, perhaps even to international scrutiny by a body such as the Carter Center. Indians may resist examination by a foreign organization. But is there an Indian organization the public would trust, and that could audit the Commission's process, records and actions in full?
