Centre announces committee to examine ‘one nation, one election’

New Delhi:  The government will form a committee to study the feasibility of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "One Nation, One Election", Union Minister Rajnath Singh said after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's all-party meeting today. Most parties, he said, had supported the idea.

Five major parties, including Congress, skipped the all-party meet called by PM Modi. Mamata Banerjee expressed reservations about the modality of such a project and Mayawati mocked the government.

Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and DMK chief MK Stalin also stayed away. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, former Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party chief N Chandrababu Naidu and Telangana Chief Minister K Chandresekhar Rao sent representatives.

But Rajnath Singh acknowledged that there were some, such as the Left parties, who had concerns about its implementation. The committee being set up by PM Modi would look into all these issues, Rajnath Singh said.

CPM’s Sitaram Yechury, a sharp critic of PM Modi’s ‘one nation, one election’ plan, had declared early in the day that he would be present to oppose the idea that he insisted was ‘fundamentally anti-federal and anti-democratic’.

He said the idea was flawed and that it would “tamper” with the constitutional scheme of accountability of the government to the legislature.