The Trinamool Congress claimed a political win after the Supreme Court on Monday directed the Election Commission to make public the list of voters with logical discrepancies in the special intensive revision (SIR), a demand that Bengal’s ruling party had repeatedly raised.
“The issue that we had raised in the Parliament, in the streets, in the court has got the nod from the highest court in the country,” Abhishek Banerjee, Trinamool’s general secretary told assembled supporters in Barasat, North 24 Parganas.
“This is what we wanted. The EC will have to publish the list of voters served notices under logical discrepancy.”
He added: “Today, we have defeated them in court. We will also defeat them in the elections in April.”
An upbeat Abhishek told the crowd, “This order is a slap on those who wanted to snatch the democratic rights of the people of Bengal. The BJP’s SIR game is over.”
Minutes before Abhishek took to the dais, in the Supreme Court, a three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant, Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Joymalya Bagchi said the names of the voters called for hearing in the ongoing SIR of electoral rolls under the logical discrepancy category would have to be displayed in gram panchayat offices, in the blocks, talukas, sub-divisions and ward offices in the urban and semi-urban areas within three days.
In a message on X, Abhishek wrote: “We wholeheartedly welcome the landmark direction of the Supreme Court to the Election Commission. This much-needed intervention has dealt a decisive blow to the cruel, politically motivated and deeply unjust SIR process. The SC has rightly ordered that the names of those arbitrarily slapped with the vague, sinister label of “logical discrepancy” must be publicly published.”
The Trinamool had repeatedly demanded that voters with “logical discrepancy” – initially pegged at around 1.36 crore in Bengal – be made public.
“See the strain and stress going on for the ordinary people… over 1 crore people are affected,” Justice Joymalya Bagchi orally observed.
The apex court also directed the poll body to allow the admit card of secondary exams (Madhyamik) bearing date of birth to be considered as a valid SIR document during the hearings.
Voters whose names are included in the logical discrepancy category are allowed to submit their documents in the panchayat and ward offices and where required they can authorise booth level agents (belonging to any political party) for assistance during the hearings.
The Trinamool had also flagged the issue of booth-level agents (BLAs) not being allowed to attend the hearings several times in the past two weeks.
In Hooghly’s Chinsurah, a Trinamool lawmaker stopped a hearing after the BLAs were not allowed.
Trinamool Rajya Sabha MP Dola Sen, who was among the petitioners in the case in the apex court, said the bench’s directions would come as a major relief to the state’s electorate.
“With due respect to the Election Commission, an inhuman situation was being created by them,” Sen told The Telegraph Online.
“People were suffering. We have always known that in the absence of birth certificates, the Madhyamik admit card worked as proof of date of birth. But the commission refused to accept it. The domicile certificates issued by the state have not been included among the list of documents. The directions [of the court] are in favour of the people,” she said.
Dola Sen. PTI picture
Last Thursday, the Election Commission had turned down a plea from Bengal’s chief electoral officer to include the Madhyamik admit card among the list of valid documents for the SIR.
The BJP scoffed at the Trinamool’s victory claim.
“A party which said will not let SIR happen, the chief minister herself created as many hurdles as possible, the Trinamool is trying to hide its defeat by claiming victory,” Shishir Bajoria, who is the Bengal BJP’s in-charge of voter-list-related matters, told The Telegraph Online.
The three-member bench of the Supreme Court instructed the state’s director-general of police to ensure that the SIR hearing process is held seamless across the state with no disruption in the law and order.
On Monday, violence was reported from Lalbagh in Murshidabad, Nadia’s Kalyani, Burdwan’s Jamuria, Kulpi in South 24-Parganass at the government offices where the hearings are being held.