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‘Won’t Base My Stand On Other Contenders’: Shashi Tharoor To News18 On Lok Sabha Fight | N18VTrained to negotiate crisis as a former UN under-secretary-general and diplomat, Shashi Tharoor will be fighting Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekar — BJP’s Lok Sabha candidate from Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala — for his fourth term.In 2004, when Tharoor took the poll plunge, it was to use his stronger vocabulary carefully than being in the minefields of Bosnia. But he managed to not only defeat the then reigning champions but continued to hold on to the Lok Sabha seat despite the Left giving a tough fight to him, and infighting from the Congress where even today many consider him to be an outsider and maverick.Tharoor lost the Congress presidential election against Mallikarjun Kharge in 2022 because he was not the favourite with many of his party colleagues who also labelled him as a “traitor”. But he put up a decent fight by securing 1,072 votes. He is also not trusted by many within his party, especially those from Kerala, because of his frequent praising of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policies.

The three-member Election Commission, at the moment, has just one active member: Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar. Reason: the shock resignation of Election Commissioner Arun Goel on Saturday coupled with another vacancy (retirement of Anup Pandey in February).

The resignation, which has been accepted by the President, comes weeks before the Lok Sabha elections.

The Lok Sabha polls are to be held in April-May. The dates were expected to be announced sometime next week, sources had told NDTV.

It is not clear what was the provocation behind Mr Goel’s shock resignation. Mr Goel, 61, had a tenure until 2027 and was in line to replace Rajiv Kumar as the Chief Election Commissioner after the latter’s retirement next year.

Mr Goel, a 1985-batch IAS officer of the Punjab cadre, had joined the Election Commission in November 2022.

Sources have indicated there have been differences on various issues and it would be best for the Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar to explain. Top officials said Mr Goel cited personal reasons while resigning.

“The government will start the process of appointing other election commissioners,” said an official.

Late last year, the Centre enacted a law that excluded the Chief Justice of India from the process to appoint the country’s top election officers. The top poll officers are now to be appointed by the President on the recommendation of a panel comprising the Prime Minister, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha and a Union Cabinet Minister nominated by the Prime Minister.

Before that a search committee, consisting of the law minister and two secretaries will have to short list five names for the selection committee headed by the Prime Minister to chose from.

The top poll body was set to visit Jammu and Kashmir from Monday to Wednesday to assess when polls can be held in the Union Territory, sources had told NDTV. Sources added that the Lok Sabha poll dates were to be announced right after the completion of J&K visit.