The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to allow excluded voters in Bihar to submit their claims both online and offline during the special intensive revision (SIR) of the electoral roll in the poll-bound state.
A bench comprising Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi ruled that claim forms can be submitted along with Aadhaar numbers and any one of the 11 acceptable documents under the SIR exercise.
Expressing surprise at the lack of objections from political parties over the exclusion of 65 lakh voters, the apex court ordered the Chief Electoral Officer of Bihar to make all political parties part of the proceedings.
“All political parties must submit a status report on the claim forms they helped excluded voters file,” the bench said, posting the matter for September 8.
The court also directed election officials to issue acknowledgement receipts to booth-level agents of political parties who physically submit claim forms for excluded voters.
Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, representing the poll panel, urged the court to allow the ECI 15 more days to demonstrate that voter exclusion was not as widespread as alleged. He assured the court that the ECI would show there were no major discrepancies.
The ECI informed the bench that about 85,000 excluded voters had already filed claims and over two lakh new voters had registered under the SIR process.
On August 14, the Supreme Court ordered the poll panel to publish details of the 65 lakh excluded voters by August 19 to ensure transparency and to allow Aadhaar as an acceptable identity document.
The revision of Bihar’s voters’ list—the first since 2003—has sparked a major political controversy after the total number of registered voters dropped from 7.9 crore to 7.24 crore following the SIR exercise.
