The Supreme Court will on July 10 hear petitions challenging the Election Commission’s order for a “special intensive revision” of electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar as an unconstitutional move that could disenfranchise over 3 crore voters.
The bench of Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Joymalya Bagchi agreed to an urgent hearing on a request from senior advocate Kapil Sibal and others, who cited the poll panel’s approaching deadline of July 25 for prospective voters to submit their documents.
The bench, however, sought to allay the petitioners’ fears about the tight timeline saying the July 25 deadline “does not have any sanctity as you know, elections have not yet been notified”. The Bihar polls are expected in October-November.
Among the petitioners are the Association for Democratic Rights (ADR) and the People’s Union for Civil Liberties. Also, a joint petition has been filed by the Congress, Nationalist Congress Party, CPI, CPM, DMK, Samajwadi Party, Shiv Sena (Uddhav) and the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha.
Individuals like RJD parliamentarian Manoj Jha and Trinamool MP Mahua Moitra too have joined the legal battle against the poll panel’s notification.
Only those whose names are not on the rolls of 2003 — the last time the Bihar rolls underwent a special intensive revision (SIR) — would need to provide documentation. The 2003 rolls had 4.96 crore names; the current rolls have 7.9 crore. (The rolls undergo yearly summary revisions.)
What has scared the Opposition is that this will be the first SIR to demand proof of citizenship from all registered voters who are not on the 2003 rolls.
Another worry is that Aadhaar, PAN and ration cards will not be accepted as proof, although passports — which fewer people possess — will be.
The ADR’s petition, filed through advocates Prashant Bhushan and Neha Rathi, argues that the SIR order violates Articles 14 (equality before law), 19 (free speech), 21 (right to life and liberty), 325 and 326 (voting rights) of the Constitution.
The order also violates the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and Rule 21A of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960 (relating to name deletions from the rolls).
The ADR has clarified that it considers an SIR a positive step and is objecting only to the manner in which it’s being conducted in Bihar.
It says the June 24 SIR order’s exclusion of Aadhaar and ration cards “make(s) marginalised communities and the poor more vulnerable to exclusion from voting”. It adds that the exercise has shifted “the onus of being on the voters’ list from the State to citizens”.
The “SIR process is violative of Article 326 in so far as it requires a voter to provide documents to prove his/ her citizenship and also citizenships of his/ her mother or father (if the voter has been born after 1987)...,” the ADR says.
“There are lakhs of citizens whose names did not appear in the 2003 electoral rolls (and) who do not possess the documents as required under the SIR order; (and) there are many who may be able to procure the documents but the short timeline mentioned in the directive may preclude them from being able to supply the same within the time period.
“Bihar is a state with high poverty and migration rates where many lack access to documents like birth certificates or parental records. As per estimates, over 3 crore voters and more particularly from marginalised communities such as SC, STs and migrant workers, could be excluded from voting due to the stringent requirements….
“Moreover, Special Summary Revision (SSR) was already conducted between October 29, 2024, and January 6, 2025, which addressed issues such as migration and ineligible voters due to death or other reasons. Thus, there is no reason for such a drastic exercise in a poll-bound state in such a short period of time....”
The admissible documents include passports, birth certificates, school board or university certificates, government or PSU I-cards or pension payment orders, caste certificates, land or house allotment certificates, permanent residence certificates and forest right certificates.
