Editorial 1 : Push for transparency: What Supreme Court order on Bihar SIR says
Context
The Supreme Court on Thursday issued an interim order directing the Election Commission of India (ECI) to make available online a searchable list of approximately 65 lakh voter names omitted from the draft electoral roll for Bihar, along with reasons for deletion, such as death, migration, and duplication.
Challenge to SIR
- With the state set to head to polls in November, the ECI announced the Bihar SIR late in June.
- It said that demographic changes in the last 20 years meant that current electoral rolls contained many repeated entries and the situation warranted an intensive verification drive to verify each person before enrolment as an elector.
- Soon after this announcement, multiple petitioners challenged the SIR on both substantive and procedural grounds.
- The substantive grounds included questions on the ECI’s powers to conduct such an exercise.
- The procedural grounds pertain ed to the modalities of conducting the SIR, including whether the 11 documents notified by the ECI to prove “citizenship” were valid; whether the 2003 voter list could be a valid cut-off date for inclusion; and whether Aadhaar could be excluded as a valid proof of identity for inclusion in the voters’ list.
- These issues are yet to be determined by the apex court. However, in oral observations, the SC has indicated that ECI has the power to conduct such an exercise. This can also be inferred from the fact that the SC has allowed the SIR to continue.
- The interim order pushes for greater transparency and partially addresses the contentious issue of including Aadhaar as a valid proof of identity and residence in the process.
SC’s interim order
- The ECI had, in its affidavit, told the SC that it was not required by law to publish a separate list of electors removed from the draft electoral rolls or to provide reasons for their non-inclusion.
- The ECI, in court, cited apprehensions that political parties might aggregate the data and that the publication could be a violation of the fundamental right to privacy.
- The SC has, however, pushed back on this argument, underlining a citizen’s fundamental right to know why he or she has been deleted from the voter list.
- The court has directed the ECI to publish lists in which one can search by entering the EPIC number whether a voter has been deleted, and the reasons for such deletion.
- The lists are required to be booth-wise, and also have to be displayed on the notice board of respective Panchayat Bhavans and offices of the Block Development Officer or Panchayat Officers.
- This essentially enables individuals and political parties to check if a voter from the constituency has been removed from the rolls, and whether this exclusion is justified.
Conclusion
- Therefore Election Commission must ensure full compliance with the Supreme Court’s directive by publishing a booth-wise, searchable online list of deleted voters along with reasons, while maintaining a balance between transparency and privacy.