Narendra Modi didn’t heckle the “anti-Hindu” Election Commission after he won Gujarat. Lalu Yadav dropped his thesis on an “upper caste” EC even though he lost Bihar. So why is the Left doing what two of our most aggressive political hecklers didn’t? The Left won Bengal in an election that even Mamata Banerjee couldn’t call unfair and by a margin that surprised everyone, including Left strategists. Whatever may have been the Marxists’ grouse against the EC — and in a rambunctious democracy disagreements are inevitable, sometimes necessary — political common sense should have told them an offensive would bring them no dividends. The battle to make the EC a truly independent election watchdog took decades. Any political party that launches a sustained offensive — as the Left is planning — can only attract near-universal criticism.

The critique will be stronger because the Left is attacking the commissioners on grounds that have no basis in reason. There’s no earthly reason why retired commissioners shouldn’t contest polls. In a free country anyone not bound by public employment obligations should be able to participate in elections. To argue otherwise is, frankly, ridiculous. The point about monitoring EC expenditure is both disingenuous and dangerous. Disingenuous because in a government set-up where wasting money for populist and political fancies is routine, spending by the EC isn’t really the most important issue. The argument is dangerous because it gives politicians a handle to harass a statutory body tasked to monitor them. Unscrupulous politicians will find this a godsend. Does the Left want to help them?

More important is the question whether the Left’s anger against the EC is a reflection that India’s third largest political group, after the Congress and the BJP, hasn’t quite come to terms with the concept of institutional checks and balances. Whether what the Left has done in Bengal in terms of politically co-opting institutions is the model it wants for India? If the Left wants to rule India, as it surely does, it must know India doesn’t want that.