Assam voting rights: SC seeks EC secy’s presence

The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Election Commission's secretary to appear before it on March 12 in connection with a PIL alleging that several categories of people in Assam have been deprived of voting rights ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.

The apex court sought the personal appearance of the secretary as despite the notice being issued on February 1 no one appeared to represent the poll panel.

The categories included some whose names figure in the draft NRC but not in the voter list.

A bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justices S A Nazeer and Sanjiv Khanna took a serious view of the contention made in the petition filed by two Assam-based residents, Gopal Seth and Susanta Sen.

The PIL alleged that a category of people whose names were deleted from the voter list were some whose names appeared in the draft NRC published on July 30, 2018. These people had voted in the Lok Sabha election held in 2014.

Another category was of those whose names were not included in the complete draft NRC, but they subsequently filed claims for inclusion of their names in it. They had voted in the earlier Lok Sabha elections and were waiting for the inclusion of their names.