Reviving a nearly two-decade-old proposal, the Election Commission has made a fresh push for amending law to bar people from contesting from more than one seat and has said that if it cannot be done, then a hefty fine should be imposed on those vacating one of the constituencies and forcing a bypoll.
In a recent interaction with the Legislative Secretary in the Law Ministry, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar made this push for the reform first proposed in 2004.
The Legislative Department is the nodal agency in the government to deal with issues related to the EC. As electoral law stands today, a candidate is permitted to contest an election from two different constituencies in a general election or a group of by-elections or biennial elections. If a person is elected from more than one seat, then the person can only hold on to one of the seats that he or she won.
