How the Election Commission Works — and Where It Falls Short

The Election Commission of India (ECI) was established on January 25, 1950 — one day before India became a republic — under Article 324 of the Constitution. It is a constitutional body vested with "superintendence, direction and control of the preparation of the electoral rolls for, and the conduct of, all elections to Parliament and to the Legislature of every State and of elections to the offices of President and Vice-President." Over its 75 years, the ECI has built a remarkable record in a specific domain: conducting elections that are logistically extraordinary in scale, broadly free from violence and ballot fraud at the polling station level, and characterised by consistently high voter turnout. The T.N. Seshan era (1990–1996) was transformative — Seshan aggressively used the ECI's plenary powers under Article 324 to enforce the Model Code of Conduct, transfer partisan election officials, and assert ECI's independence from the executive in ways no predecessor had attempted.

Representational Image: How the Election Commission Works — and Where It Falls Short

The ECI's record on procedural election management — ensuring that ballots are cast and counted accurately across a million polling stations — is, by most assessments, impressive. Its record on the broader dimensions of electoral integrity — controlling the influence of money, ensuring equal media access, preventing the government's misuse of state resources for campaign purposes, enforcing the Model Code of Conduct against high-profile leaders, and protecting the independence of the institution itself — has been more contested, and has deteriorated measurably in recent years. Verfassungsblog's 2024 review described the perceived credibility of the ECI as having undergone "a sustained downfall over the last decade." Multiple structural factors explain this — the appointment process, the MCC's lack of statutory force, and the ECI's dependence on the government for finances and staff.

Before You Read On

• Article 324(2) provides that the ECI shall consist of the Chief Election Commissioner and such Election Commissioners as the President determines; the CEC cannot be removed except by a process equivalent to Supreme Court judge impeachment; Election Commissioners (other than the CEC) can be removed on the recommendation of the CEC — a hierarchy that creates institutional vulnerability.
• The 2023 Anoop Baranwal v. Union of India Supreme Court judgment directed that CEC and EC appointments should be made by a three-member committee of Prime Minister, Leader of Opposition, and Chief Justice of India; Parliament responded with the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023, replacing the Chief Justice with a Cabinet Minister nominated by the Prime Minister — effectively returning the executive to majority control of the appointment process; this legislation is challenged in the ongoing Jaya Thakur case before the Supreme Court.
• The Model Code of Conduct — covering candidate conduct, government announcements, use of government machinery, and campaign behaviour — is operational from election announcement to result declaration; it has no statutory backing; the ECI enforces it through moral authority, show-cause notices, official reprimands, and occasionally election schedule changes; critics argue enforcement is selective, particularly against high-profile leaders from the ruling party.
• Insightsonindia's February 2026 analysis documented: the Bihar SIR (Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls) controversy in 2025, where allegations emerged that minority and migrant voters were disproportionately targeted for deletion; the rapid appointment of two Election Commissioners in March 2024 just before the Supreme Court could hear a stay petition against the new appointment legislation — "drawing heavy criticism"; and ongoing Jaya Thakur litigation examining whether the CJI's exclusion violates separation of powers.
• The ECI does not have independent permanent staff — it depends on central and state government officials for election administration; this dual reporting — officers answering both to government for routine work and to ECI for election duty — is structurally problematic for impartiality, though in practice local election officials are typically honest in their ballot management functions.

How It Works in Practice

1. Plenary powers under Article 324: The ECI has what the Supreme Court described in A.C. Jose v. Sivan Pillai (1984) as "plenary powers" — the authority to act even in areas where no specific statute guides, if necessary to ensure free and fair elections. This residual power has been used by activist CECs to transfer officials, cancel elections in violence-hit constituencies, and direct state governments. It is the constitutional foundation for the ECI's authority but its breadth also makes its exercise inherently discretionary.

2. Model Code of Conduct enforcement: The MCC's key provisions prohibit the government from announcing new welfare schemes, starting construction projects, making political appointments, or using government resources for campaigns from the election announcement to result declaration. In practice: petrol prices are often held stable before election announcements and changed immediately after; welfare scheme announcements are timed to just before the MCC comes into force; and star politicians who violate MCC provisions by making communal or inflammatory speeches receive letters of censure rather than actual legal consequences.

3. Election machinery during voting: The ECI's operational management of election day — deployment of EVMs, training of polling officers, coordination of security forces, management of counting centres — is consistently effective. This is the ECI's strongest institutional performance domain: India's elections are conducted with logistical precision that most democracies would struggle to match at equivalent scale.

4. Voter roll integrity: The maintenance of electoral rolls — who is registered to vote — is a critical function with significant potential for partisan manipulation. The Bihar SIR controversy in 2025 highlighted allegations that the intensive revision process was used to delete voters who belonged to communities that typically vote against the ruling party. Electoral roll accuracy is both a democratic essential and a potential tool of voter suppression if managed with partisan intent.

5. What the ECI cannot do: The ECI cannot regulate the content of political party manifestos; cannot require political parties to publish internal governance accounts; cannot set spending limits for political parties (only for individual candidates); cannot effectively prevent the government from using the state apparatus — central scheme advertising, government television time — for what amounts to political communication; and has no authority over the content of social media political messaging except through platform notices and content requests.

What People Often Misunderstand

• The ECI is not the same as its most famous Chief Election Commissioner: T.N. Seshan's activism in the 1990s represented an exceptional period of aggressive institutional assertion; the ECI under other CECs has been more deferential to government; the institution's performance depends significantly on the individual CEC's willingness to use Article 324's plenary powers assertively.
• Voting is not the only dimension of electoral integrity: A country can have accurate vote-counting without having genuinely free elections; media access, campaign finance equity, freedom from state harassment, equal government resource usage, and impartial administration are equally critical dimensions that the ECI's record is more contested on.
• The state election commissions are entirely separate institutions: Local body elections in India are the responsibility of State Election Commissioners — separate appointments, separate functioning, separate accountability; when municipal or panchayat elections are delayed by state governments (a documented pattern across multiple states), the ECI has no authority to intervene.
• The ECI's data transparency has deteriorated: The Verfassungsblog December 2024 review noted that the December 2024 amendment to Conduct of Election Rules restricted public access to CCTV footage and other election documents that courts had ordered be provided; this represents a directional change away from transparency.
• Election Commissioner independence is structurally weaker than CEC independence: The CEC's removal requires parliamentary super-majority impeachment; Election Commissioners can be removed on the CEC's recommendation — making them structurally more vulnerable to pressure from the CEC, who is in turn more exposed to executive influence than the constitutional text ideally provides for.

What Changes Over Time

The Jaya Thakur case — challenging the constitutionality of the 2023 CEC appointment legislation — is the most significant pending institutional development; its outcome will determine whether the Supreme Court has the authority to enforce its own Anoop Baranwal judgment against a parliamentary statute. The Bihar SIR 2025 controversy has generated sustained opposition legal challenges and civil society documentation of alleged roll manipulation. The AI deepfake regulation challenge — documented in Insightsonindia's 2026 analysis — represents a new frontier of electoral integrity that the current ECI framework is not equipped to address systematically.

Sources and Further Reading

• Vajiramandravi — Election Commission of India: https://vajiramandravi.com/current-affairs/election-commission-of-india-eci/
• Drishti IAS — Independence of the Election Commission: https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-updates/daily-news-analysis/independence-of-the-election-commission-of-india
• Verfassungsblog — Democracy and the ECI: 2024 in Review: https://verfassungsblog.de/democracy-and-the-election-commission-of-india/
• Insightsonindia — Independence of the Election Commission: https://www.insightsonindia.com/2026/02/24/independence-of-the-election-commission/
• ilearncana — Issues with the functioning of ECI: https://ilearncana.com/details/Issues-with-the-functioning-of-Election-Commission/2603

(This series is part of a long-term editorial project to explain the institutions, ideas, actors, and power structures that shape political life in India. Designed as a 25-article briefing cluster on Indian Politics, Elections & Political Power, this vertical examines how electoral democracy functions in practice — from voting systems, political parties, caste coalitions, campaign finance, and the Election Commission to ideological movements, opposition politics, coalition-building, and the exercise of political power at both national and state levels. Written in an accessible format for diplomats, investors, researchers, academics, journalists, students, policymakers, civil society organisations, and international observers, the series seeks to explain not only how India's political system is formally structured, but also how political competition, representation, and governance operate in reality. This is Vertical 5 of a larger 20-vertical knowledge architecture being developed by IndianRepublic.in under the editorial direction of Saket Suman. All articles are protected under applicable copyright laws. All Rights Reserved.)