The Election Commission has requested Calcutta High Court to allow it to publish day-to-day supplementary lists so that the under-adjudication voters whose names get deleted have more time to appeal before the tribunals.
“We have been told that a decision on this could be taken after the second supplementary list is published on Friday,” a senior poll panel official said.
The commission has so far come out with just one supplementary list — published on Monday night — since the preliminary “final” list was released on February 28.
While the 705 judicial officers had by Monday disposed of nearly 29 lakh cases, the list carried only 10 lakh names since, because of an apparent oversight, the orders on the remaining cases did not contain the adjudicators’ e-signatures.
How many among these 10 lakh had been cleared to vote and how many were rejected remains unclear, with sources suggesting an about 41 per cent deletion rate.
By now, about 35 lakh among the 60.06 lakh under-adjudication cases have been disposed of.
“The second list will be published tomorrow, but it’s yet unclear how many names (rejected or approved) it will carry,” a commission source said.
“This is because only the cases whose disposal orders carry the e-signatures of the judicial officers will be included.”
If the 41 per cent deletion rate holds, at least 14 lakh names would have been deleted from among the 35 lakh cases disposed of so far.
After a list has been published, a deleted voter has 15 days to challenge the decision before the tribunals set up across the state.
“The deleted voters will need the time to prepare their applications and arrange the documents specified by the poll panel before they submit them online or physically at the SDOs’ or district magistrates’ offices,” a poll panel source said.
“So, if they learn about the deletion of their names at the last minute, it would be difficult for them to appeal before the tribunals.”
The poll panel needs high court permission to publish daily supplementary lists because this will require it to revise the previous schedule submitted to the court.
Besides, the list is first sent to the high court, which forwards it to state and national election authorities for uploading — so, daily publication would mean daily clearance from the court.
“Under the current schedule, the third list is to be published on April 3,” a commission official said.
“But that may make it too late for the voters to appeal before the tribunals, as April 6 is the last date for including voters’ names for the first phase of elections on April 23. Therefore, the poll panel has requested the high court to allow it to publish supplementary lists every day.”
Poll panel sources said 1.5 lakh to 2 lakh cases were being disposed of daily.
On a directive from the Supreme Court, Calcutta High Court has already set up 19 tribunals, headed by retired judges.