The Election Commission of India (ECI) has reinstated supervisory oversight over its information technology (IT) division, placing its director-general, Seema Khanna, under the supervision of a senior deputy election commissioner (DEC).

The move comes three months after a media investigation raised questions about the functioning of the IT division and the alleged bypassing of established oversight mechanisms.

According to The Telegraph, an order issued on October 4 directs Khanna to route all files concerning IT, Information and Communication Technology (ICT), and Grievances/Public Grievance Redressal System (PGRS) through senior DEC Pawan Kumar Sharma.

“She would put up files of above-mentioned functional divisions through Sr. DEC(PKS),” the order states.

Khanna, who heads the ECI's IT division and oversees its digital infrastructure, including electoral roll management systems, had come under scrutiny following objections raised by two Election Commissioners, Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi, over what they described as unilateral decisions by Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar. Among the contentious decisions was the removal of the supervisory arrangement that required Khanna to route files through a DEC, allowing her to submit them directly to the Commission.

The two Election Commissioners had also raised concerns about Khanna allegedly acting on “direct oral orders” from the CEC.

The controversy intensified after an internal order issued on July 28 by senior DEC Maneesh Garg removed DEC Sanjay Kumar from the charge of the IT and ICT divisions.

Sandhu and Joshi subsequently wrote to Cabinet Secretary T.V. Somanathan, raising objections to Garg's work allocation order. Garg had then been holding interim charge of the administration department.

The opposition has demanded prosecution of Khanna, accusing her of criminal manipulation and the illegal centralisation of the voter verification process through the ECINET platform.

However, unnamed ECI officials have disputed the suggestion that the latest order represents a change in the reporting arrangement.

According to The Hindu, they maintained that the director-general of IT had always reported to an officer at the DEC level.

“In an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court, the ECI had maintained that the July 28 order had never been implemented. The sources also said that the work allocation orders were issued as per unanimous decisions of the Commission,” the report states.

The Congress, meanwhile, has criticised the ECI's affidavit, describing it as “deceptive, deceitful and duplicitous” in addition to being “extremely damaging to itself”.

The correspondence between the two Election Commissioners and the Cabinet Secretariat has also become a point of contention. The secretariat had reportedly acknowledged their letters and forwarded a copy to the CEC for his “information”.

However, an RTI response received by Commodore (retired) Lokesh Batra revealed that the secretariat considered the letters to have been sent by the two commissioners in their “individual capacity” and not as formal communication from the Commission as a whole.

Separately, Prakash Rajpurohit, a 2010-batch IAS officer appointed as DEC following the premature repatriation of Sanjay Kumar, has been assigned to assist Garg with election planning and oversee delimitation, The Hindu reported.

Sanjay Kumar served as DEC from August 2024 until August 2026. He had signed the ECI's June 24, 2025, order initiating the nationwide Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, which began in Bihar.

The latest administrative reshuffle comes amid continuing questions over the Commission's internal decision-making and the accountability of officials overseeing its electoral technology systems.