Sukh Bir as EC Commissioners Gyanesh Kumar


Both are 1988 batch IAS Belongs to Kerala and Uttarakhand cadre

New Delhi, March 14 (Andhra Jyoti): Former IAS officers Sukhbir Singh Sandhu Gyanesh Kumar have been appointed as Commissioners of the Central Election Commission (ECI).

In this regard, the center issued a gazette notification on Thursday. A three-member selection committee headed by Prime Minister Modi met on Thursday to fill the recently created vacancies. A Union Minister and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Choudhary are members of it. Home Minister Amit Shah participated in the Union Minister Quota. A search committee headed by Union Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal has drawn up a list of proposed names for the appointment of commissioners. He also attended the meeting. After the discussion on the list, Sandhu from Punjab and Gyanesh from Kerala were selected as commissioners of the Election Commission. It is known that Arun Goyal, who was the commissioner, unexpectedly resigned last Friday. Another commissioner, Anup Chandra Pandey, retired in February. It is noteworthy that before the announcement from the government, Adhir held a media conference at his residence in Delhi and announced the details of the appointment of new commissioners.


Same batch..

Gyanesh Kumar from Kerala and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu from Punjab are 1988 batch IAS. Gyanesh served as Secretary of Parliamentary Affairs and Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Defense during the UPA government between 2007-12. Sukhbir served as the Chief Secretary to the Government of Uttarakhand and also as the Chairman of the National Highway Authorities of India (NHAI) between 2019-21. He was appointed as Lokpal Secretary on February 3 this year


When asked for the final list, 212 names were given


Adhir raised several questions on the process followed for selection of election commissioners. He is not saying that the selection was made arbitrarily, but there are errors. He opined that it would be better to have the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in the committee. When asked for the short list, 212 names were given on Wednesday night. Six names were mentioned 10 minutes before the meeting. Information about the full background of all of them is not given. However, both have been appointed. Questioning the defects in the replacement process, protested. I didn't mention anyone's names.'


Hearing in the Supreme Court today


The recent petition filed by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) against the removal of the Chief Justice from the appointment committee of the Central Election Commissioner (CEI) and Election Commissioners will come up for hearing in the Supreme Court on Friday. Madhya Pradesh Women's Congress Committee General Secretary Jaya Thakur and others approached the Supreme Court on this issue earlier