New Delhi: The Supreme Court, on Monday, passed a slew of directives on the ongoing Special Intensive Review (SIR) being conducted by the Election Commission of India (ECI) in West Bengal, with a view to bring about more transparency and reduce problems being faced by people who have been served notices, citing “logical discrepancies” in enumeration forms submitted by them.
The bench of Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Joymalya Bagchi instructed the ECI to publish the list of persons to whom notices have been sent. The lists have to be displayed in the Panchayat/Block offices.
Nearly 1.25 crores notices have been sent, the court noted, citing discrepancies such as mismatch in parents’ names, low age-gap with parents and the number of progeny of the cited parents.
People, who have received notices from the ECI, will also be entitled to submit their documents/objections through their authorised agents, who can be the Booth Level Agents (BLAs). The agents have to be appointed through a letter marked with a signature or thumb impression, the Court clarified, as reported by Live Law.in.
The court also took into consideration the concerns expressed by the petitioners that persons will have to travel hundreds of kilometres to respond to the notices, and directed that the office for submitting the documents/ objections shall be set up within the Panchayat Bhavan/ Block offices. If the documents are found to be unsatisfactory, the election officers should give the persons an opportunity of hearing, which can be attended by the authorised agent.
The Court also directed that on receiving the documents or on hearing the affected person, election commission officials shall certify the receipt of the documents or hearing.
The state government was also directed to ensure adequate manpower to the ECI for the process. The Director General of Police of West Bengal was also directed to ensure that no law-and-order problem arises during the process.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for certain Trinamool Congress members, submitted that many persons who have been included in the draft voters list have been served with notices of hearings, citing “logical discrepancies.” Sibal said that names like “Ganguly”, “Datta”, etc, can be spelt in different ways, and these spelling differences are cited as reasons for notices. Sibal added that in some cases, notices are sent on the ground that the age difference with the parents is less than 15 years. He requested for the publication of the logical discrepancies, and also to allow the BLAs to assist the voters in the hearings. He submitted that the notices require the persons to travel hundreds of kilometres.
Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, representing the ECI, submitted that instructions have been issued to the officers not to send notices citing spelling differences. However, cases where the age difference with the parents is 15 years or less are flagged as a “logical discrepancy”.
Justice Bagchi reacted to this and said: “Why is it a logical discrepancy? How can a 15 years age gap between mother and son be a logical discrepancy?”
He pointed out that “it is not as if we don’t have child marriages in the country.”
Dwivedi also said that BLAs cannot insist that in every hearing, they should be allowed to represent the voters. BLAs are members of political parties, and they cannot be involved in the hearing, Dwivedi said. He clarified that a person can authorise an agent to represent him, and the agent can include a BLA, he added.
Senior advocates Shyam Divan and Kalyan Banerjee added to what Sibal had said and submitted that instructions have been sent to Booth Level Officers (BLOs) through WhatsApp messages instead of formal orders and hence, there is no transparency in the process. He wondered how the age difference with parents or grandparents can be a relevant consideration and asked what was the statutory basis for the actions of the ECI.
Notices have even been sent to Nobel laureate Amartya Sen and sitting MPs, and “profiling” of voters was at play, Banerjee alleged.
Dwivedi refuted the allegations though and exclaimed, “:if the ECI is to be distrusted, let not the ECI hold the elections at all!”.
Senior advocate Dama Seshadri Naidu, representing the ECI in a connected matter, submitted that the election officials were facing obstructions and threats in the state and were unable to perform their duties.
The bench observed that its aum is to bring about more transparency in the system and reduce inconvenience for valid voters.
“Some correction exercises can be taken, but it should be transparent,” CJI Kant said.
“See the strain and stress going on for the ordinary people, over 1 crore people are given notices…do not create a third issue here, that’s all we are requesting,” Justice Bagchi said.
