The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the publication of the Bihar draft rolls by the Election Commission on August 1, following the conclusion of the special intensive revision (SIR) of the voter list, but warned of quashing the entire exercise if it found any irregularities.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi also asked the EC to include both Aadhaar and voter ID cards as valid documentary proof, saying: “There should be mass inclusion and not mass exclusion.”

The apex court was dealing with a batch of petitions challenging the poll panel’s SIR order of June 25 as being illegal and unconstitutional. The petitioners fear that the exercise would render over 3 crore voters ineligible ahead of the Bihar polls.

Justice Kant, heading the bench, rejected the EC’s argument that documents such as Aadhaar and ration cards were prone to forgery.

“Why only EPIC (Election Photo Identity Cards) or Aadhaar? For that matter, any document on earth can be forged. Let us proceed with Aadhaar and EPIC. You proceed on a case-by-case basis,” the bench told senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi appearing for the EC.

Dwivedi said there were “large-scale issues with ration cards”.

“For EPIC, the pre-filled enumeration form has the EPIC number, but since the electoral number is revised, EPIC cannot be conclusive,” he added.

“You say none of the documents are conclusive. As per the SIR notification, suppose someone uploads the form with Aadhaar, why will you not include it in the draft?” Justice Bagchi asked.

Agreeing with Justice Bagchi, Justice Kant observed: “Tomorrow you may say not only Aadhaar but out of the 11 documents listed by you (for the SIR), any of them can also be forged. That’s a separate issue. But we are against mass exclusion. It should be mass inclusion. Please include Aadhaar.”

Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for the NGO Association for Democratic Reforms, pressed for an interim stay on the publication of draft electoral rolls that he said could lead to the disenfranchisement of lakhs of voters.

Dwivedi argued that voters would get sufficient time to file their objections to the draft rolls.

While refusing to stay the draft notification, the bench said the apex court was empowered to quash the whole process if it detected any irregularities.

“It was already said that the process cannot be stayed. Trust us, as soon as we find anything is wrong with the process, we will quash everything,” Justice Kant said.

The bench later listed the matter for further consideration on Tuesday during which the court would fix a schedule for the advocates to argue their cases.

In its counter-affidavit, the EC had on July 21 submitted that it had the power to conduct the SIR and determine citizenship, and that a large portion of Bihar’s population already possessed at least one of the 11 documents listed by it as valid proof.

The ADR has questioned the haste in conducting the SIR — the process started on June 25 and the final rolls are expected to be published on September 30 — which it fears will eliminate around 94 lakh eligible voters from the list.

“The SIR order does not prescribe any procedure regarding the scrutiny of enumeration forms or the verification of documents, thereby conferring upon EROs (electoral registration officers) arbitrary, unbridled and excessive discretionary powers, which can disenfranchise a huge percentage of the population in Bihar,” the ADR
submitted.

The ADR has accused the poll panel of mass uploading of enumeration forms without the consent of voters. The NGO has claimed that the enumeration forms of
deceased individuals were also being uploaded as part of the SIR.