Lavasa letter: CEC denies rifts over MCC

New Delhi, May 18 (IANS) Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora on Saturday denied any controversy in the internal functioning of the Election Commission over the handling of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) saying that "the three members of the Commission are not expected to be templates or clones of each other".

The CEC's reaction came on reports of a letter written to him by Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa, recusing himself from attending Full Commission meetings held to decide on MCC violations, after his dissent on the clean chit given to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President Amit Shah on their respective speeches, went unrecorded.

Lavasa, in his letter, insisted that he would attend the meetings if his minority decisions were also included in the orders of the Commission.

"There has been an unsavoury and avoidable controversy reported in sections of the media today about the internal functioning of Election Commission of India with respect to the handling of the Model Code of Conduct.

"This has come at a time when all the CEOs (Chief Election Officers) and their teams across the country are geared towards the seventh and last phase of polling tomorrow followed by the gigantic task of counting on May 23," said a statement issued by the CEC.

"The three members of the ECI are not expected to be templates or clones of each other. There have been so many times in the past when there has been a vast diversion of views as it can and should be," said the statement.

The three-member "Full Commission" consists of Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora and two Election Commissioners, Ashok Lavasa and Sushil Chandra.