Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led high-powered committee will meet on March 14 to finalise the names of two new Election Commissioners, top sources said. The meeting is to be held at noon.
The Law Ministry has sent an amended communication to all panel members for the meeting, sources said. Earlier, the meeting was slated at 6 pm on March 15.
On Friday, following the resignation of Arun Goel and Anup Chandra Pandey’s retirement on February 14, two vacancies of election commissioners have come up.
The selection panel is chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and has a Union minister. The panel has the Leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury as its member. The President will appoint the election commissioners.
Just days before the poll panel is expected to announce the schedule for the Lok Sabha elections, Arun Goel resigned on Friday morning. President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday accepted his resignation. Goel’s tenure was until December 5, 2027.
For now, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar is the sole member of the Election Commission (EC).
Goel was a 1985-batch IAS officer. He was from the Punjab cadre. In November 2022, he joined the EC.
Initially, the Election Commission had only a chief election commissioner. Currently, it consists of the chief election commissioner and two election commissioners.
(With PTI inputs)