Cold war worsens between SEC, CM

The bad blood between State Election Commissioner (SEC) Nand Lal and Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh worsened on Monday after Lal accused the CM of trying to influence the functioning of the SEC.

In a letter dated January 19, the SEC had directed Deshmukh to deposit expenses incurred by him during his political and private functions of December 24-25, 2006, at Pune and Kolhapur with the state treasury after it had already announced the election programme for 10 municipal corporations in the state.

Subhash Suryavanshi, SEC public relations officer, said that the SEC had urged the CM to deposit expenses incurred while hiring a helicopter and an aircraft for his December tour by February 2. He added that the SEC had cited cases involving chief ministers of Chhatisgarh and Punjab in the notice.

But a source with the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) said that the CMO had already submitted a clarification to the notice. The source added that the SEC had already been apprised that Deshmukh would be attending official functions. In a nine-page letter, SEC took strong objection to Deshmukh’s use of aircraft and helicopter to travel to two districts in Western Maharashtra.

The SEC detailed the nature of the functions as “political and private functions aimed at influencing voters when the Model Code of Conduct for Elections to Local Bodies was in effect”.