Who is Sushil Chandra, the new Chief Election Commissioner?

India's new CEC Sushil Chandra

Sushil Chandra takes charge as the new Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) on April 13 replacing Sunil Arora whose term ended on April 12.

Chandra, 63, is a 1980-batch Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer and was the senior-most election commissioner, ahead of Rajiv Kumar, in the three-member poll panel. Thus, President Ram Nath Kovind appointed him as the new CEC in line with the convention.

Chandra is the 24th CEC of India. Born on May 15, 1957, Chandra did his B-Tech from Roorkee University. He also holds a degree in LLB from DAV College, Dehradun. Before joining IRS in 1980, he was in the Indian Engineering Service.

Chandra who served as a revenue service officer for 38 years was posted as the Chairman, Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) - the apex body looking after policy administration and implementation of Direct Taxes in India - from November 2016 until February 2019 when he was appointed Election Commissioner. 

He comes with varied experience in various areas of taxation for he has held sensitive posts in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Delhi, according to the Election Commission of India website. While he has also worked in the areas of litigation, compliance management, and International Taxation, his forte has been in the field of Investigation where he spent considerable time as Director of Investigation and Director General of Investigation, Mumbai, and Gujarat, respectively followed by his stint as Member (Investigation), CBDT.

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Chandra is counted among officials who were at the forefront of the Central government’s fight against black money as he is credited for spearheading the department’s action against tax evasion in the wake of demonetization in 2016.

“He actively strengthened the Government's clampdown on Benami transactions by executing the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988,” reads his profile on the election commission website.

During his tenure as Chairman, CBDT, he also led from the front while playing an active role in the unearthing of illegal money used during the Assembly Elections. Under his leadership, CBDT launched “Operation Clean Money” in 2017 in a bid to curb illegal wealth and black money.

Set to demit office on May 14, 2022, Chandra will oversee the remaining four phases of ongoing assembly elections in West Bengal. The final phase will take place on April 29. Votes will be counted and results declared on May 2. In his tenure, Chandra is likely to oversee elections in the states of Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Goa, Uttarakhand, and Manipur.

In his nearly two-year tenure as a member of the panel headed by Sunil Arora, Chandra was involved in holding assembly elections in at least ten states including Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu. Puducherry and four phases in West Bengal.

Assembly elections that were held during Chandra’s tenure as election commissioner include Maharashtra and Haryana (October 2019), Jharkhand (December 2019), Delhi (February 2020), and Bihar (October-November 2020).  He also worked towards making the election nomination filing process online.

A January 2019 report in Economic Times said that Chandra's brother-in-law, Arvind Goel, was probed by the Uttar Pradesh government for allegedly buying and selling about 200 acres of land parcel in Moradabad district through suspected black money. The transactions, according to the report, occurred between 2004 and 2017.