'Why are you entering citizenship domain through SIR?': SC rebukes ECI while hearing voter roll plea ahead of Bihar assembly polls

The Supreme Court on Thursday began hearing a batch of petitions challenging the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) decision to carry out a Special Intensive Revision ( SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar ahead of the state assembly elections.

A partial working day bench comprising Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and Joymalya Bagchi heard arguments from multiple senior lawyers, including Rakesh Dwivedi, representing the ECI, who raised preliminary objections to the maintainability of the petitions. Senior advocates K K Venugopal and Maninder Singh also appeared for the Commission.

Appearing for one of the petitioners, senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan said the Representation of the People Act does permit the revision of electoral rolls. He told the bench that the SIR in Bihar would cover approximately 7.9 crore citizens and flagged concerns that Aadhaar and voter ID cards were not being considered in the process.

Key observations and queries from the Supreme Court:

• “Why are you connecting the SIR in Bihar to the upcoming assembly elections? Why can't the exercise be conducted independent of the election schedule?” the bench asked the ECI.
• The court directed the Commission to respond to three specific issues: whether the ECI has the power to conduct such a revision, the procedure adopted for it, and the timing of the exercise.
• “This SIR exercise is an important issue, as it goes to the root of democracy and the power to vote,” the court told the poll panel.
• The court also questioned the exclusion of Aadhaar cards from the list of accepted documents in the ongoing voter roll revision process in Bihar.
• “Why are you entering the citizenship domain through the SIR? That is the domain of the Ministry of Home Affairs,” the bench told the Commission.
• The EC responded that citizenship is a necessary criterion to qualify as a voter under Article 326 of the Constitution.
• The bench, however, remarked, “If you intended to verify citizenship during this exercise, then this move should have come earlier. It seems a bit late now.”
• The EC said the revision process is constitutionally mandated and pointed out that the last such special revision took place in 2003.