A television journalist sets his camera inside the premises of the Supreme Court in New Delhi.
Credit: Reuters Photo
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said electoral rolls cannot be static, as the "one time exercise is only for preparation of the list but there has to be revision exercise on regular basis".
Hearing a batch of petitions challenging validity of Special Intensive Revision in poll bound Bihar, the apex court said that the expansion of the number of documents by the Election Commission is a "voter-friendly" and not "anti-voter" exercise.
"Look at the number of documents by which you can prove citizenship," a bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi told the counsel challenging the validity of process initiated by the EC.
The bench said the 11 documents required to be submitted by an elector now as opposed to seven documents in summary revision conducted previously showed the exercise was "voter friendly".
The court noted that though the petitioners' arguments were that non-acceptance of Aadhaar was exclusionary, it appeared the large number of documents was "actually inclusionary".
"The number of documents in summary revision conducted earlier in the state was seven and in SIR it is 11, which shows it is voter friendly. We understand your arguments that non-acceptance of Aadhaar is exclusionary but a high number of documents is actually inclusionary," the bench told the counsel.
Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for one of the petitioners, said that the EC had surprisingly invented new documents requirement for eight crore voters.
"Even if I'm in jail, I can't be removed from the roll without due process... Here, the 65 lakh removed voters were not disqualified on any such grounds. The EC has carried out mass exclusions...Who gave the EC authority to do this," he asked.
To this, the court said, "But the electoral list cannot remain static. A one time exercise is only for preparing the original list and it must be revised."
Sankaranarayanan further added that the ECI has begun the process in West Bengal too, without any consultation.
He said, "The right to be on the roll is sacrosanct. The Constitution guarantees my right to be registered as a voter."
Senior advocates A M Singhvi and others also argued on behalf of the petitioners during the hearing which is scheduled to continue on Thursday.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for one of the petitioners, alleged malafide intent on the part of the EC. He said the EC refused to publish names of deleted voters with reasons, and removed searchable draft rolls just one day after Rahul Gandhi's press conference.
On this, the court said, it was not aware of any such press conference.
NGO- ADR, People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Lok Sabha Member of Parliament (MP) from Trinamool Congress Party, Mahua Moitra, Rashtriya Janta Dal MP Manoj Jha, Congress Party leader K C Venugopal and Mujahid Alam among others have challenged the validity of the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Bihar.
The petitioners sought a direction to set aside the EC's SIR order of June 24, 2025.