In the Bihar SIR row, the Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Election Commission to disclose the identity of 65 lakh deleted voters from electoral roll by August 19. The Supreme Court also asked the poll body for compliance report by August 22.
EC should identify persons deleted from voter list
The Supreme Court said the Election Commission should identify persons deleted from voter list along with reason and make it public.
During the hearing of the matter, the EC agreed in the Supreme Court to share list of voters who have died, migrated or shifted at district level.
EC will accept Aadhaar card as acceptable document to establish identity
The Supreme Court stated that booth level officers will also display the list of deleted voters and the Election Commission will accept Aadhaar card as an acceptable document to establish identity.
A bench of Justice Suryakant and Justice Jaymalya Bagchi said that transparency is needed about the 65 lakh voters removed so that people can seek clarification or correction. The next hearing of the case will be on August 22 at 2 pm.
SC says electoral rolls cannot "remain static"
While hearing the matter on Wednesday, the Supreme Court had said that electoral rolls cannot "remain static" and were bound to be revised as it disagreed with the submission that special intensive revision (SIR) of voter list in poll-bound Bihar had no basis in law and ought to be quashed.
A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi was informed by NGO Association of Democratic Reforms that the exercise should not be allowed to be carried out pan-India.
Apart from the NGO, leaders of opposition parties including Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Congress have challenged the electoral roll revision drive of the Election Commission of India (ECI) in Bihar.
Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for the NGO, said the ECI notification on SIR ought to be set aside for want of legal basis and never being contemplated in law. He, therefore, contended it couldn't be allowed to go on.
The EC can never conduct such an exercise since inception and it is being done for the first time in history and if allowed to happen only God knows where it will end, he added.
"By that logic special intensive revision can never be done. One-time exercise which is done is only for the original electoral roll. To our mind, the electoral roll can never be static," the bench noted.
"There is bound to be revision," the top court said, "otherwise, how will the poll panel delete the names of those who are dead, migrated or shifted to other constituencies?"
SC says EC had residual power to conduct such exercise
The Supreme Court bench went on to tell Sankaranarayanan that the ECI had residual power to conduct such an exercise as it deemed fit.
During the hearing of the matter, the bench also told senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for petitioners, that the 11 documents required to be submitted by an elector for Bihar’s SIR as opposed to seven documents in summary revision conducted previously showed the exercise was "voter friendly".
On August 12, the top court said inclusion and exclusion of citizens or non-citizens from the electoral rolls was within the remit of the Election Commission and backed its stand to not accept Aadhaar and voter cards as conclusive proof of citizenship in the SIR of voters' list in Bihar.
With inputs from agencies
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