New Delhi, August 12: The Supreme Court of India on Tuesday began hearing multiple petitions challenging the Election Commission of India’s (EC) decision to conduct a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar.
A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi heard arguments from senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing RJD leader Manoj Jha, who alleged serious discrepancies in the process. According to Sibal, in one constituency, the EC claimed 12 people were dead but they were later found alive, while in another case, living citizens were incorrectly declared dead.
Representing the Election Commission, senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi acknowledged that minor errors were possible in such a large-scale exercise but stressed that these could be corrected, as the SIR was still at the draft roll stage.
The court directed the EC to be ready with detailed data — including the number of voters before and after the SIR, and the number of deceased persons identified — to ensure transparency in the process.
The dispute stems from opposition parties’ claims that the SIR, launched on June 24, could lead to the “mass exclusion” of eligible voters in Bihar. The draft roll was published on August 1, and the final roll is expected on September 30, ahead of state elections.
The EC, in an affidavit, defended the exercise as necessary for maintaining the “purity” of elections by removing ineligible names from the rolls. It also said it was acting in line with the law and past practice.
The petitions have been filed jointly by several prominent political leaders, including Mahua Moitra (TMC), K C Venugopal (Congress), Supriya Sule (NCP – Sharad Pawar faction), D Raja (CPI), Arvind Sawant (Shiv Sena – Uddhav Thackeray), Sarfraz Ahmed (JMM), and Dipankar Bhattacharya (CPI-ML), along with civil society groups like the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), and activists such as Yogendra Yadav.
The Supreme Court had earlier allowed the EC to continue with the SIR but warned it would intervene if evidence of widespread voter disenfranchisement emerged.