SC to EC: Consider Aadhaar, voter ID & ration card for SIR

New Delhi: Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Election Commission to consider accepting Aadhaar , voter ID card and ration card as valid documents for its special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar and allowed the process to go on. Though the court flagged the practical difficulty in completing the task within the short timeline as it was tied to the state polls, EC assured 60% of the work was already done.

Noting that EC itself accepted that the list of 11 approved documents was not an exhaustive one, a bench of justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and Joymalya Bagchi said it was prima facie of the view that the commission should also consider Aadhaar and the other two documents. It said Aadhaar was already considered a relevant identity document for electoral rolls.

The court, however, twice clarified that it was not a direction but a suggestion to the EC which could be discarded but for which the panel has to give reasons.

Initially, the court was in favour of restraining EC from publishing draft rolls which is scheduled for August 1 but it refrained from doing so after the commission strongly opposed it. Thereafter, the court posted the hearing for July 28 to take stock of the situation before publication of draft rolls.

The bench said in its order it was Priima facie of the opinion that there were three questions which needed to be examined in the case — power of EC to conduct the process; the procedure to exercise the power; and the timeline which was very short as Bihar elections are due in November.

The court witnessed two-and-ahalf hours of intense arguments with senior advocates Gopal Sankaranarayanan, Kapil Sibal, A M Singhvi and Shadan Farasat challenging the validity of EC’s decision. The high-stakes legal duel saw the poll panel fielding senior advocates Rakesh Dwivedi and Maninder Singh along with former attorney general K K Venugopal to justify the decision.

During the hearing, SC said while EC was discharging its constitutional duty and it was not doubting the commission’s effort and sincerity, there was an issue of perception and practical difficulties which had to be examined. It questioned why the process started so late and why it was linked with the Bihar assembly election which is to take place in November. Dwivedi said being a constitutional body like judiciary, the EC could not answer about perception but only on law and there was no illegality.

“If you ask me, then I would not be able to furnish those documents. You are talking about law but I am talking about practicality,” Justice Dhulia said. Dwivedi further said EC could not and does not intend to remove people from the list and a wrong perception was being created against the exercise because of a premeditated mindset.

But the bench asked why EC took the decision suddenly and why it was related to the Nov election. “We appreciate the exercise done by you. Nobody disputes that. But with such a big population, is it possible to link the exercise to the ensuing election... We have serious doubts whether you will meet the timeline. It is not practical,” the bench said.

Trying to dispel the court’s doubt, Dwivedi said the exercise was going on in full swing, and 60% of the work was already done. He said political parties were also helping in the exercise. He successfully prodded the court not to pass any interim order and to list the case days before publication of draft rolls to take stock of the situation.

The court issued notice to EC on the batch of petitions filed by opposition parties — Congress, NCP (SP), CPI, CPM, CPI (ML), DMK, Samajwadi Party, Shiv Sena (UBT), JMM, RJD and TMC. In addition, Yogendra Yadav, NGOs Association for Democratic Reforms and People’s Union for Civil Liberties, and a few residents of Bihar have also filed petitions against the poll panel’s decision.