14 objections inside the Election Commission: What were the concerns and why do they matter?

The Election Commission of India faces another controversy after discovering that two of its three Election Commissioners recorded at least 14 formal objections over a ten-month period.

Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi raised objections between October 2025 and August 2026, including issues ranging from communications and new voter registration to access to electoral-roll software and appeals concerning West Bengal’s Special Intensive Revision, or SIR.

The Election Commission denies that the objections were evidence of an internal rift and maintains that written observations and disagreements during internal deliberations are common. It also states that decisions of the Commission, including those of SIR, were taken unanimously.

What were the 14 objections?

1. October 28, 2025 — Letters issued without Commission approval

Sandhu objected to letters and orders being issued in the name of the Election Commission without what he stated was the Commission’s approval.

2. April 16, 2026 — New IT modules and portals

Sandhu raised concerns about new IT modules and portals that were being developed for the Commission, stating that he had not learned about them through the Commission’s internal processes.

3. April 16 — Messages issued without approval

Sandhu again raised the issue of communications being sent in the Commission’s name without its approval.

4. April 16 — Meeting procedure

Joshi objected to the fact that, for more than a year, minutes of Commission meetings were being issued after meetings were held while the agenda for the next meeting was not provided in advance.

5. April 16 — Officials travelling abroad

Joshi questioned the process by which officials were being sent on foreign visits without the approval of the Commission.

6. April 24 — Official communications

Joshi repeated his objection that messages should not be issued without the Commission’s approval.

7. May 16 — Form 6 and the SIR process

Joshi objected to the introduction of an additional declaration connected with SIR for new voter applicants. He argued that changes of this nature could not be made without amending the rules. Sandhu subsequently supported this concern.

8. May 29 — Centralisation of voter data

Joshi raised concerns that control over the electoral-roll database was becoming increasingly centralised. He proposed an audit to establish that only legally authorised election officials could make changes to voter data.

9. July 29 — Work allocation

Joshi wrote to Cabinet Secretary T V Somanathan about changes to the allocation of work within the Election Commission, expressing concerns about the manner in which the changes had been made.

10. July 29 — Sandhu's separate objection

Sandhu separately wrote to the Cabinet Secretary about the same work-allocation issue, seeking action concerning the officer involved.

11. July 30 — Work-allocation order set aside

Sandhu and Joshi jointly set aside the new work-allocation order and restored the previous arrangement until the Commission could reach consensus on any change.

The episode followed a July 28 order under which Senior Deputy Election Commissioner Maneesh Garg received additional administrative responsibilities and a change to the allocation of work.

12. August 12 — West Bengal appeals

Sandhu questioned who had authorised appeals filed before tribunals in West Bengal relating to voters during the SIR process. He stated that none of him, Joshi or the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer had been informed regarding the basis or procedure for these appeals.

13. August 13 — SIR-related declaration

Sandhu returned to the issue of the new SIR-related declaration for voter applicants, describing the change as "unauthorised and illegal" and calling for its removal.

14. August 14 — Access to ECINet/ERONet

Sandhu raised concerns that field-level election officials did not have appropriate access to the electoral-roll system. He questioned the legal authority of the IT division to restrict access to statutory election officials.

Why did the objections matter?

While at first glance, several of the objections may appear to be internal administrative disputes, a common thread of many of them was who had the authority to control the systems through which India’s electoral rolls were being prepared and modified.

Preparation of electoral rolls involved statutory officials such as Electoral Registration Officers at both the state and constituency levels. The two Commissioners raised concerns that access to the digital database was becoming increasingly centralised.

This issue was particularly relevant to SIR, when electoral rolls were being extensively revised.

The issue was apparent in Goa, where during the SIR process, software flagged voters for "logical discrepancies". Electoral Registration Officers then discovered 97 voters eligible for inclusion, but the ECINet system did not have a mechanism to roll back or reverse the earlier deletion and restore the names in time.

The final roll published on February 21 did not include those 97 voters. The episode therefore raised questions regarding whether the software would allow statutory officials to implement decisions that they had already made in individual cases.

West Bengal presented another issue. The Election Commission informed the Supreme Court that 38.31 lakh appeals were pending before tribunals, including 22.21 lakh appeals by voters seeking restoration of their deleted names and 16.10 lakh appeals seeking deletion of voters who had been included.

Some appeals seeking the deletion of voters appeared to have been made on behalf of the Commission, prompting Sandhu to question who had authorisation and who had filed them.

What about Form 6?

This is one of the important areas of the controversy because Form 6 is filled by those applying to become voters.

According to the reported exchanges, an additional SIR-related declaration was introduced for applicants, asking whether they, their parents or grandparents appeared on an electoral roll from the previous SIR.

Joshi objected to the change, arguing that such an alteration required amendment to the relevant rules. Sandhu later described the change as "unauthorised and illegal".

However, the Election Commission states that there was no change to the existing Form 6 itself. It has stated that the SIR-related declaration was added as a separate annexure.

The distinction is essential: the reported objection concerned the introduction of the additional declaration, while the ECI's position is that the statutory Form 6 itself was not altered.

What does the law say about disagreements inside the EC?

The Election Commission is a three-member constitutional body under Article 324 of the Constitution.

Under Section 18 of the 2023 law governing the appointment and service conditions of the Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners, the Commission’s business is, as far as possible, to be conducted unanimously. If the members disagree, the matter is decided by majority.

The law also provides that the Commission’s procedure and division of work should be settled by unanimous decision.

The distinction is essential.

The fact of objections does not in itself establish that the Commission acted unlawfully. Nor does the Election Commission’s assertion that decisions were unanimous erase the fact that the objections were recorded.

What the latest controversy highlights is therefore not only whether two Commissioners differed with the CEC.

It is also a matter of how India’s electoral machinery makes decisions, who controls the digital infrastructure behind them and how internal disagreements are documented and resolved.

For voters, this process is important because the electoral roll is the starting point of the democratic process. The factual issue is what action, if any, followed each objection and how those concerns were resolved.

As of September 24, the Election Commission maintains that its decisions were unanimous. The reported objections, however, show that numerous questions were raised internally about how some decisions and systems were handled.

The controversy is therefore centred on how the objections were handled and how decisions relating to electoral-roll systems were ultimately taken.