What led to INDIA bloc showdown with EC over Bihar electoral roll update?

Asserting that as much as 20 per cent of poll-bound Bihar’s over 8 crore voters may be disenfranchised as a result of the Election Commission’s decision to conduct a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the state’s electoral rolls, the Opposition dubbed the exercise as “votebandi” on Wednesday (July 2).

A delegation of the Opposition’s INDIA bloc met the EC in New Delhi on Wednesday evening to demand that the SIR, if necessary, be put off till after the Bihar assembly polls that are due around October-November. However, the leaders claimed that the poll panel was “unwilling to listen to reason” and was determined to go forward with an exercise whose consequences would be a “brazen violation of the Basic Structure doctrine” as it would “disenfranchise lakhs, if not crores, of Bihar voters, especially those who migrate outside the state for work or are from the poor and marginalised sections of the society”.

Heated exchange

Sources said there was also a heated exchange between some members of the INDIA bloc delegation and EC officials both “before and during the meeting”. Senior Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who presented the legal arguments against the SIR on behalf of the INDIA parties, told reporters after the nearly three-hour-long meeting with the poll panel that, in an “unprecedented and undemocratic” move, the EC had decided to meet only the chiefs of political parties or leaders “authorised” by their respective party presidents.

The 20-member INDIA bloc delegation, with leaders drawn from the Congress, the RJD, Left parties, the NCP-SP and others, had sought an appointment with the EC to register their objections against the SIR announced for Bihar last month. Singhvi, however, told reporters that when the delegation arrived at the EC headquarters at Nirvachan Sadan, its members were told “only party chiefs will be allowed to go in”.

Also read: EC postpones meeting with multi-party delegation on Bihar electoral roll revision

Sources told The Federal that this led to a heated argument between the Opposition leaders and EC officials, following which the delegation was told that not more than two leaders per party will be allowed to go in for the meeting. As a result, senior Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera and former Bihar Congress chief Akhilesh Prasad Singh had to “could not be part of the meeting and had to wait outside for nearly three hours,” Singhvi said.

The legalities of EC move

During the meeting, Singhvi, along with RJD MP Manoj Kumar Jha and CPI-MLL leader Dipankar Bhattacharya, led a spirited charge against the SIR, with Singhvi quoting multiple Supreme Court judgments that, in his view, would be violated by the EC if the electoral roll revision is carried out as per the current directives as “it will invariably lead to denying lakhs and lakhs of Bihar voters their constitutionally given right to vote”.

Bhattacharya, it is learnt, told the EC that the SIR is akin to “votebandi” as “over 20 per cent of Bihar’s voters who migrate out of the state for work” will not be able to get themselves enrolled afresh within the one-month deadline that the EC has set for the ongoing exercise. Jha, sources said, pointed out that the actual number of those who may end up having their “right to vote stolen from them” will be much higher as aside from Bihari migrants “people from the poorest, oppressed and marginalised section of society and those displaced year after year during the Kosi floods or other natural calamities will not be able to produce the documents required to remain on the electoral rolls”.

Also read: Bihar: EC to upload 2003 voters’ list; 5 crore people need not submit docs

Jha, Bhattacharya and Bihar Congress chief Rajesh Kumar, sources said, accused the EC of “trying to steal the election for the BJP (and its ruling NDA partners in the state)” by trying to “have those voters deleted who are expected to vote for the Mahagathbandhan (the RJD-Congress-Left alliance in Bihar)”.

EC’s argument

EC officials, Singhvi claimed, justified the need for an SIR on grounds that it was the Opposition that had “raised so many questions on the electoral rolls after (last year’s) Maharashtra polls”.

During his presentation before the EC, Singhvi questioned the poll panel’s decision to not accept Aadhaar as proof of age and residence “after the government spent over a decade or more trying to force Aadhaar on everyone” and pointed out that as per the EC’s SIR circular, “now, unless one is already in the electoral roll of 2003, all other names require a birth certificate, and in one category, the birth certificates of both parents are needed.”

As per the SIR circular issued by the poll body late last month, those born after 1987 will have to furnish not only their own birth certificates but also those of their parents to remain on the electoral rolls. Singhvi asked the EC officials “how do you expect the backward, flood-affected, poor, and migrant populations to run from pillar to post to obtain birth certificates for themselves or their parents? If a person fails to obtain the certificate within the time limit, they risk losing their place on the electoral roll.”

Also read: Vote from home: Bihar becomes first state to facilitate voting via mobiles

A month not enough

Poll panel officials are learnt to have argued that people whose names are wrongly deleted from the electoral rolls will have a month to file objections and have their names reinstated if their bona fides are established. The Opposition, however, countered this by asserting that a month is neither enough to conduct an exercise as expansive as the SIR nor sufficient to make the rectifications “once names are removed en masse”.

The INDIA bloc leaders also pointed out that many voters may have neither time nor resources to legally challenge the deletion of their names and that the EC’s argument that deleted voters can produce the necessary documents and have the names reinstated on the electoral roll is “flawed as the reason for deletion itself is the non-availability of the documents listed currently in the circular”.

Agitation threat

While Singhvi told reporters that the Election Commission “heard us but was completely disinclined to accept our submissions”, Jha and Bhattacharya struck a more belligerent note. The RJD and CPI-MLL leaders threatened a “mass agitation” if the SIR is allowed to proceed.

Sources told The Federal that the INDIA bloc leaders are “convinced that the EC will not accept even a single suggestion given by us” and that “other options, including a challenge before the EC, mass mobilisation of voters to protest against the SIR, disruption of the upcoming monsoon session (of Parliament) and petitioning the President of India” are being discussed among them.

Also read: Discussion: EC's Bihar voter revision sparks disenfranchisement fears

“In a day or two, we will share what we plan to do next on this issue. All options are open and we can only hope that better sense will prevail; this conspiracy to steal the election at the behest of the EC’s political masters at the Centre cannot go unchallenged or it will create large-scale unrest across not only Bihar but the country because if they succeed in Bihar, other states will follow,” Jha told The Federal.