But Where Is Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar?

New Delhi: As students, opposition parties, civil society groups, youth groups and the citizens of India protest across the country, in various ways, demanding the resignation of India’s chief election commissioner, one question is being met with a steely silence – where is he?

This has been a long week, and Gyanesh Kumar has been omnipresent on posters, memes, conversations, slogans and on the street as thousands turned up asking for his removal, or just to meet him.

But he is nowhere to be found.

All we have heard about Kumar and his activities since The Indian Express’s exposé on the workings of the Election Commission on September 23 has been one photo, of him with election commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi on September 26 released by the Election Commission. This came along with a press note that was seen as an admission of guilt on the part of the EC – it did not deny the Indian Express report, and rolled back or probed some controversial decisions.

For other chief election commissioners of the past, it would be normal to not have had a photo published or a public appearance recorded in three weeks. But Kumar is no ordinary chief election commissioner, as reports over the last few years have made clear. Before September 23, the EC social media handles posted multiple photos and videos of him each week – meeting foreign dignitaries, going to temples, delivering public addresses, reels of his foreign trips, and even some videos of him walking that were slowed down for cinematic effect. Just on September 22, for instance, there were three different photos of Kumar posted.

Until the protests and the recent reports, there was barely a day or two when a smiling Kumar did not appear on the commission’s social media handles. Since September 23, however, there has been not a sign of the chief election commissioner anywhere – not on social media, not at a press conference, not at public events, and not even on TV channels friendly to the Union government. EC social media handles have continued to post the commission’s activities around the SIR, but Kumar is now conspicuously absent.

Two youth outreach events where Kumar was supposed to speak in Uttar Pradesh were cancelled, and unnamed EC officials have told newspapers that this was for logistical reasons and not anything to do with the protests or the outrage over the SIR. A group of former civil servants, including former home secretary G.K. Pillai and former Delhi LG Najeeb Jung, tried to give the CEC a memorandum, but couldn’t even get close. Opposition MPs who wanted to meet the Election Commission were not allowed to reach the offices, and detained after they sat on dharna for hours at the Akashvani Bhawan nearby demanding a meeting.

Questions by media persons on WhatsApp groups of the Election Commission have been met with silence, or digression, with spokesmen sending tweets instead of various state CEOs. Once, the group was full of photographs of Gyanesh Kumar Gupta wearing a broad smile and triggering sniggers about the absent colleagues, but photos of him have vanished since.

Narendra Nath, an independent journalist, came on Ravish Kumar’s show this week, saying that top sources confirmed to him that despite a Union minister promising Modi that the three election commissioners would jointly address a press conference at the exact time that LOP Rahul Gandhi was planning to march with INDIA MPs from Parliament House to the President of India with a memorandum, the two election commissioners refused point blank. We cannot confirm if what Nath learnt is the absolute truth, but the fact is that there has been no joint press conference and the media team of the EC has not shared details of any meeting of the entire Election Commission.

The BJP has claimed that the protests taking place are attempts at bringing about “anarchy”, and the Delhi Police is cracking down on those demanding Kumar’s resignation with the full might of the state. One would then assume that Kumar’s role is so central, so significant, that he cannot be away for a single day.

The question of where he is, then, should be as important to the government as it is to citizens.