The Election Commission has told the Supreme Court that the statutes do not require it to cite reasons for dropping from the draft rolls the names of voters whose enumeration forms it has not received.

The poll panel expressed the position in a written affidavit, replying to a submission from petitioner and poll watchdog ADR (Association for Democratic Reforms), which has asked that the deleted names and the reasons for the deletions be made public.

The commission reaffirmed, however, that it had shared with the political parties the deleted names and the reasons for the deletions — a claim the INDIA parties have denied.

Deputy election commissioner Sanjay Kumar underlined that Rules 10 and 11 of the Registration of Electors Rules (RER), 1960, mandate the electoral registration officer (ERO) to make a copy of the draft roll “available for inspection” and “accessible to the public” of the area it relates to.

The ERO has to also give two copies of each draft list to recognised political parties.

“It is submitted that the statutory framework does not require the Respondent (poll panel) to prepare or share any separate list of names of people not included in the draft electoral rolls, or publish the reasons for non-inclusion of anyone in the draft electoral rolls for any reason,” Kumar said in the affidavit, filed on Saturday night.

The poll panel added that “no such list can be sought by the petition as a matter of right” and that those whose names have been dropped can register again as electors, if eligible.

The SIR, launched on June 25 — five months before the term of Bihar’s Assembly ends — has become a rallying point for the Opposition, which fears that the document-based citizenship verification for all the voters would disenfranchise genuine ones as many do not possess the required documents.

The poll panel says the draft list includes all who submitted the enumeration forms. Any deletions for want of documentation or any other reason would follow the legal process of sending the voter a notice first.

Around 65 lakh names that figure on the existing electoral rolls have been removed from the draft SIR rolls. These include the names of the dead and those who have permanently shifted out of Bihar or are untraced. For those found enrolled in multiple places, their additional enrolments have been deleted.

In Sunday’s reply, the poll panel attached photos and attested minutes of meetings with booth-level agents (BLAs) of the parties, where the reasons for not including these names in the draft rolls were given.

This has been held up as proof of the commission going beyond the letter of the law to include parties in the process.

A media release from the commission showed that no political party had filed any claims or objections until Sunday afternoon, although 8,341 individual voters had done so.

However, on Saturday night, Patna’s district election officer had made a post on X about the CPIML Liberation’s complaint against the deletion of the names of four voters from the Phulwari Assembly constituency.

The party also claimed that two booth-level officers (BLOs) in Darbhanga district had been removed after it complained against their deletion of the names of voters from the backward classes.

The CPIML Liberation’s parliamentary party office-in-charge, N. Sai Balaji, questioned the commission’s reply to the apex court.

“Then, on what basis was the ECI providing the breakup of these 65 lakh people — dead, relocated, duplicate and untraceable? If there is no statutory provision to do so, what was the basis?” he told The Telegraph.

Notice to Rahul

The Karnataka chief electoral officer (CEO) has sent a notice to Rahul Gandhi, asking him to furnish documents to prove his allegation that a 70-year-old woman, Shakun Rani, was registered in two booths in the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency and had voted twice in last year’s general election.

While making the allegation, Rahul had cited portions of the electoral rolls and what appeared note sheets of polling agents of political parties, which carried a tick mark beside her name at two polling booths.

Polling station officials record the signature of a voter in a register, and do not merely put a tick against their names.

The notice says: “On inquiry, Smt. Shakun Rani has stated that she has voted only once and not twice, as alleged by you…. Preliminary enquiry conducted by this office also reveals that the tick marked document shown by you in the presentation (copy enclosed) is not a document.”

The CEO was silent, however, on the allegation of Rani’s name appearing twice on the rolls.

The Congress on Sunday released the names of 30,000 voters of Mahadevapura to whom the rolls attribute invalid door numbers such as 0, - and #.

Although this practice was traditionally used to register voters in slums and small villages, most settlements now have proper door numbers.

“How did EC BLOs approve House Number 0? What address proof did they verify?” the Congress asked.

“How are BLAs (of the parties) supposed to verify the voter when the address is not known or doesn’t exist?”

The poll panel has described this allegation as “false and misleading”.