Bihar electoral roll revision: Why SC hearing on July 10 is crucial

The Supreme Court, on Monday (July 7), said it would hear petitions challenging the ongoing special intensive revision (SIR) of Bihar’s electoral rolls on Thursday (July 10) even as the Election Commission has continued to dismiss apprehensions raised against the SIR by multiple Opposition parties.

Also read: Bihar: 'No change' in electoral rolls revision process, clarifies EC after its ad

The decision of the apex court came against petitions filed by the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR), RJD MP Manoj Kumar Jha, Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Mahua Moitra and activist Yogendra Yadav. While these petitions had been filed over the past week, it is learnt that the Supreme Court’s registry has received several more pleas since Saturday (July 5) and more petitions on the issue are likely to pile up ahead of the July 10 hearing.

Opposition’s joint petition

Congress media department chief Pawan Khera said his party, along with nine other political parties, had collectively filed a challenge “to the flawed and destructive Special Intensive Revision (SIR)” and that “the entire Opposition stands together to oppose an exercise that is guaranteed to disenfranchise vast number of voters due to its malicious and mischievous methodology.” Among the signatories to the Opposition’s joint petition are Congress MP KC Venugopal, NCP-SP MP Supriya Sule, CPI leader D. Raja, CPI-MLL leader Dipankar Bhattacharya, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Arvind Sawant, Samajwadi Party’s (SP) Harinder Malik and JMM’s Sarfaraz Ahmed.

Also read: BJP conspiring to deprive Bihar voters through special revision of electoral rolls: Kharge

Among other petitioners who have moved the apex court to challenge the SIR is also former Bihar MLA Mujahid Alam, who had recently quit the ruling Janata Dal (United) in protest against the party’s support to the controversial Waqf Act passed by Parliament during the Budget session. Sources said Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, which had made significant electoral in-roads into Bihar’s economically and socially backward Seemanchal region during the 2020 Assembly polls, could also file a separate challenge against the SIR.

The AIMIM, like the RJD, Congress and the Left Parties, is of the view that if the SIR is allowed to be conducted in its present format, the highest number of voter disenfranchisement would take place in the Seemanchal region, which has a sizeable Muslim population.

No oral observations by SC

The legal challenge before the Supreme Court, one of the counsels for the petitioners told The Federal, was necessitated since the Election Commission (EC) “stubbornly refused to entertain any suggestion or objection raised by not one but multiple Opposition parties with regard to the SIR”.

Also read: RJD MP Manoj Jha moves SC against EC revision of electoral rolls in Bihar

On Monday, the Supreme Court did not make any oral observations about the merits of the petitions except stating that the timeline for the SIR, a key point of contention since the voter enumeration exercise is to conclude by July 26, “doesn’t have sanctity as the elections have not been notified yet”.

Sources said the July 10 hearing would be crucial in the case as counsel for petitioners are likely to make a spirited case for an interim stay on the SIR. “That (an interim stay) is the most important demand by all of us who have challenged (the SIR) because this exercise has been deliberately designed in a way that a large number, lakhs if not crores, of voters, especially Muslims, extremely backward castes and those living along the Kosi river belt which is vulnerable to annual flooding, will find it very difficult to provide one of the 11 documents the EC has made mandatory for voter enumeration,” RJD MP and petitioner Jha said.

Enumeration process to conclude by July 26

Former MLA Alam, whose petition is yet to be listed, told The Federal, “The current timeline says the enumeration process for those who were not on the electoral roll before January 1, 2003, has to conclude by July 26 so that the electoral rolls can be readied by August 1; the figure of such voters who have to be re-enumerated is over four crore.”

Alam added, “As per the EC’s notification, the entire SIR process, including training of Booth Level Officers (BLOs), enumeration and finalising of rolls, has to be concluded within one month. Is it realistically possible to conduct such a vast exercise in just 30 days? The only purpose here is to remove Muslims, EBCs and poor people from the electoral roll to give an advantage to the BJP and JD (U) because these sections of Bihar’s population are particularly disillusioned with Nitish Kumar’s governance for different reasons”.

Sources said if the apex court is disinclined to grant an interim stay, the petitioners could demand that that the list of documents identified by the EC to prove a voter’s bona fides must be expanded to also include Aadhaar, ration card and MGNREGA job card, among others.

Interestingly, on Sunday, with petitions challenging the SIR mounting steadily, Bihar’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) had said that individuals who cannot furnish the documents enlisted by the EC at the time of submitting the voter enumeration forms to BLOs could do so later. Many had seen the move as a climb down by the EC while others had wondered if the Bihar CEO’s ‘clarification’ was merely meant to prevent an adverse order by the apex court.

The Election Commission’s subsequent statement that no change of rules had been made in the SIR has only added to the confusion. The poll panel did not clarify whether people could provide the documents later, as claimed by the Bihar CEO, and if so, then within how many days of submitting the voter enumeration forms.

‘What if a person doesn’t have any of 11 documents?’

Critics of the SIR, however, say that allowing submission of the documents at a later date does little to assuage the fears of imminent wide-scale disenfranchisement.

“Even if we were to believe the Bihar CEO’s statement, the fact is that the list of documents the EC is willing to accept is tailormade for denying a section of population their right to vote. In fact, the EC’s list of 11 documents includes NRC (National Register of Citizens) and family register prepared by the State; both of these aren’t even applicable in Bihar. At the same time, the list doesn’t include Aadhaar, Ration Card, job card, which are government-issued documents that a vast majority of Bihar’s poor, economically backward and underprivileged people have; so why not accept these too,” said CPI-MLL leader Bhattacharya.

He also wondered, “If a person doesn’t have any of the 11 documents currently listed by the EC at the time of filling the voter enumeration form, what is the guarantee that she or he will be able to procure one before the SIR concludes”.