CHENNAI/NEW DELHI: In what has come as the most consequential support for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter rolls, an exercise that has courted considerable controversy over the alleged omission of a large number of voters in some of the states, most notably West Bengal, the Supreme Court of India on Wednesday upheld the Election Commission’s power to conduct SIR.
The apex court bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi even stated that the exercise "breathes life" into the constitutional mandate for fair elections.
1. The Election Commission is empowered under Article 324 of the Constitution and Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act (RPA) to carry out special revisions.
2. We are unable to conclude that the exercise is a process resorted solely for administrative convenience.
3. Free and fair elections do not rest merely upon the mechanics of polling; they fundamentally depend upon the integrity, accuracy, and credibility of the electoral rolls.
4. The SIR breathes life into the constitutional mandate for fair elections
5. It does not supplant the RPA and the Rules. Rather, it breathes life into the constitutional mandate under Article 324 within the precise statutory contours provided by Section 21(3). Therefore, it cannot be said that the commission has acted in excess of its statutory powers.
6. The SIR met the requirements of proportionality and the measures adopted bore a reasonable nexus to the objectives sought to be achieved. The measures were not manifestly excessive and were accompanied by sufficient procedural safeguards to prevent arbitrary exclusion.
7. The reasons recorded by the EC, namely the passage of more than four decades since the last intensive revision, large-scale additions and deletions over the years, rapid urbanisation, migration and the resulting possibility of repetition and inaccuracies in the electoral rolls, are clearly directed towards preserving that foundational integrity.
8. EC has the authority to examine citizenship status only for the limited purpose of determining eligibility for the electoral roll. Deletion from the voter list does not amount to a legal declaration that an individual is not a citizen.
9. To prevent disenfranchisement, the poll panel should refer all cases of names being deleted on citizenship grounds to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act within four weeks. The competent authority must conclude the citizenship determination before the next Assembly or local body elections. If the authority confirms the individual's citizenship, the name must be immediately restored to the electoral rolls.