'Democracy is about eligible voters': Supreme Court validates Bihar SIR

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court on Wednesday validated Election Commission's decision to conduct Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of Bihar electoral rolls, rejected opposition's stand that it was an arbitrary and exclusionary exercise and said SIR was carried out as per EC's constitutional mandate of ensuring free and fair elections, which are founded on the integrity, accuracy and purity of voter lists.

A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi also said that in preparation of electoral rolls, the poll panel has the right to conduct a preliminary inquiry into citizenship of a person seeking to be included as a voter as only an Indian can exercise the right to franchise.

Writing the 124-page judgment disposing of a dozen petitions filed by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms, social activist Yogendra Yadav, TMC's Mahua Moitra, RJD's Manoj Kumar Jha and Congress's K C Venugopal, among others, CJI Kant said, "EC is empowered, in the exercise of its constitutional mandate, to undertake a limited enquiry into citizenship for the purpose of satisfying itself as to eligibility for inclusion in the electoral roll."

This marks a repudiation of petitioners' stand that EC had no power to inquire into citizenship status of voters for the purpose of inclusion or deletion from voter lists, though SC clarified that such an enquiry does not amount to a determination of citizenship in the strict sense, and any subsequent action is confined to electoral consequences alone.

Send list of deleted voters to MHA: SC to EC

While upholding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of Bihar electoral rolls, the Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the EC to send the list of names of those deleted from voter lists because of 'doubtful citizenship' to the competent authority (home ministry) within four weeks for adjudication of their citizenship under Citizenship Act, 1955.

The order comes amid a tougher scrutiny of citizenship claims of many and the tightening of borders, and details gathered by EC can potentially help the home ministry with detection and deportation of aliens who may have illegally crossed over from Bangladesh.

"The competent authority shall take the necessary decision in accordance with law, preferably before the next parliamentary, assembly, local body elections, whichever is earlier, after giving notice and an opportunity of hearing to the deleted individuals, if any," the bench said, adding that if they were found to be Indian citizens, their names would be included in electoral rolls.

On the need to conduct the SIR exercise in Bihar that petitioners had questioned, the bench said as it was being carried out after a lapse of 23 years and given the nature of problems it intended to address and the scale of exercise, coupled with procedural safeguards, EC cannot be held to have carried out the mandate arbitrarily.

The challenge to the number of documents required to be produced by voters during SIR scrutiny was also rejected by the CJI-led bench, which said, "The classification of documents, including the exclusion of certain categories (apart from Aadhaar Card, which was directed to be included by SC on Sept 8 last year), is based on intelligible criteria having a direct nexus with the objective of ensuring the integrity of the electoral roll."