‘Accept 11 documents or Aadhar’: Supreme Court to Election Commission on Bihar SIR
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‘Accept 11 documents or Aadhaar’: Supreme Court to Election Commission on Bihar SIR
Accept 11 documents or Aadhaar card, the Supreme Court told the Election Commission of India (ECI) on Friday while hearing a plea on the Bihar Special Intensive Revision (SIR) issue. The Supreme Court expressed surprise over political parties’ “inaction” in not coming forward with the correction of names of deleted voters in the SIR exercise in poll-bound Bihar. The EC on Monday, August 18, came out with the names of 65 lakh people who were removed from the draft electoral rolls published as part of the Sir exercise.
The EC on Monday, August 18, came out with the names of 65 lakh people who were removed from the draft electoral rolls published as part of the SIR exercise.
We will allow online submission of claims of deleted voters with Aadhaar card or any other acceptable documents for Bihar SIR, the Supreme Court said.
The Supreme Court also allowed excluded voters to make online submissions besides physical.
“…to issue specific directions to BLAs [booth level agents] to assist voters for submission of requisite forms alongwith any of the 11 documents OR Aadhaar card. In order to facilitate the voters, all above-mentioned political parties to be impleaded as respondents,” LiveLaw quoted the Supreme Court as saying in its order on Friday.
The Supreme Court expressed surprise over political parties’ “inaction” in not coming forward with the correction of names of deleted voters in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in poll-bound Bihar.
The Supreme Court took note of ECI’s submission that 85,000 new voters have come forward in SIR of Bihar, and only two objections have been filed by booth-level agents of political parties.
The issue stems from the Election Commission’s ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar, over which concerns have been raised by opposition parties about the deletion of genuine voters’ names, allegedly without proper verification.
Opposition has alleged that the SIR exercise is unfair as the 11 documents required for addition of name to the electoral roll does not include Aadhaar, which is a commonly held document as opposed to others.
The Supreme Court had directed the EC to publish the deleted names by August 19 and file a compliance report by August 22.
The EC published the names of ‘ASD’ (Absentee, Shifted, and Dead) voters across polling booths, and also online as directed by the apex court, they said.
According to the chief electoral officer (CEO), Bihar, ASD lists have been displayed at polling booths in Rohtas, Begusarai, Arwal, Siwan, Bhojpur, Jehanabad, Lakhisarai, Banka, Darbhanga, Purnea and other places.