The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Election Commission of India to consider accepting the Aadhaar card, ration card and the voter ID card as acceptable citizenship documents for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar.
The partial working days Bench of Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Joymalya Bagchi further recorded the ECI’s submission that the list of 11 documents specified by it in its June 24 notification as acceptable documents to verify citizenship was an illustrative list, and not exhaustive.
The Apex Court held that since the list was not exhaustive, it would be in the interest of justice that the ECI considered the Aadhaar card, Electoral Photo Identity Card issued by the Election Commission and the ration card as acceptable citizenship documents.
The Bench made a verbal clarification that it was not ordering the Commission to include anyone’s name in the roll solely on the basis of these documents. ECI had the discretion to accept or discard these documents, however, the Commission should provide a satisfactory reason for the same.
While listing the batch of petitions challenging the ECI’s June 24 notification for further hearing on July 28, the Apex Court directed the Commission to file its counter-affidavit by July 21.
The Bench recorded that the petitioners were not pressing for any interim relief at this stage as the next hearing was listed before August 1, the scheduled date for publication of the draft electoral roll.
The top court of the country noted that the petitions raised an important question regarding the functioning of democracy in the country and the right to vote.
It said prima facie, the matter involved three major issues, including the power of the Election Commission to undertake the exercise, the procedure & the manner in which the exercise was being undertaken, and the timing, including the timing given for the preparation of draft electoral roll, asking for objections and making the final electoral roll, which was very short, considering the fact that elections were due in Bihar in November 2025.
The notification for the polls would come in advance weeks earlier, it added.
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