The Supreme Court on Friday voiced surprise at the lack of initiative by political parties in helping restore names of voters deleted during Bihar’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, and directed that claims from excluded voters be accepted online with Aadhaar or any of 11 permissible identity documents.
A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi said claims from deleted voters can be filed digitally using Aadhaar or any other accepted ID, and asked all political parties to submit by the next hearing a status report on claim forms they helped excluded voters file. The matter will be heard next on September 8.
Also read: Supreme Court Upholds Election Commission’s Stance: Aadhaar Not Proof of Citizenship
During the proceedings, the Election Commission informed the court that while 85,000 new voters have been added in the ongoing revision, only two objections were filed by booth-level agents of political parties. The bench resumed hearing a clutch of petitions challenging the SIR, moved by RJD MP Manoj Jha, the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), PUCL, activist Yogendra Yadav, Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra, and former Bihar MLA Mujahid Alam. The petitioners have sought to quash the ECI’s June 24 order that requires large numbers of voters in Bihar to furnish proof of citizenship to remain on the rolls.
Earlier developments
- On August 14, acting on the Supreme Court’s directions, the Election Commission uploaded details of 65 lakh deleted voters from Bihar’s draft rolls on district magistrates’ websites. Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar said the upload was completed “within 56 hours” to ensure transparency. He stressed that Electoral Registration Officers and Booth Level Officers are accountable for roll accuracy, which is shared both digitally and physically with parties and the public.
- The draft rolls, published on August 1, remain open for claims and objections until September 1, with final rolls due September 30. Defending the SIR, the CEC called it a “multi-layered, decentralised” legal process, and criticised “misinformation” around the exercise.
Also read: Supreme Court Declines to Halt Bihar Voter List Revision - In an earlier hearing, the Supreme Court said it could set aside the SIR outcomes if illegality is established. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Manoj Jha, argued that the exclusion of 65 lakh voters is unlawful, while advocate Prashant Bhushan alleged the EC made the rolls non-searchable. The court observed that “everybody possesses some certificate,” pushing back on concerns over documentation.
The Court’s latest direction aims to make the claims process more accessible while holding political parties accountable for on-ground facilitation during Bihar’s intensive roll revision.