SC advances hearing on plea concerning SIR in Delhi to October 28

New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Wednesday said it would hear on October 28 a plea seeking a direction to the Election Commission to place in public domain the list of electors issued notices during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral roll in Delhi along with specific reasons for each notice.

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the petitioners, mentioned the matter before a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi.

Bhushan said petitioners have filed an application seeking a direction to the EC to provide an appropriate mechanism for inclusion of those voters, whose names were omitted from the electoral roll pursuant to SIR in Delhi, without requiring them to declare that they are applying for inclusion for the first time.

He said the period for filing claims and objections under the SIR in Delhi has been extended till October 30 after which the final voter list would be published.

Bhushan said the apex court had last month issued notice on the main petition and the matter is likely to come up for hearing on October 30.

He requested the bench that the plea be heard before October 30.

The bench advanced the date of hearing in the matter to October 28.

When Bhushan urged that the plea be heard before that, the bench observed, "We are thinking of passing an order that will take care of it".

On September 26, the poll panel extended the period for filing claims and objections under the ongoing SIR in Delhi by a month till October 30, with the final voter list now slated to be published on December 4.

The apex court on September 22 had agreed to hear the petition filed by Anjali Bhardwaj and Amrita Johri which also sought disclosure of criteria, definitions, algorithmic parameters and operational guidelines governing the classification of voters under the category of 'logical discrepancies'.

Recently, the petitioners have filed an application in the pending petition.

The application has sought a direction that no previously enrolled elector should be required to submit a declaration contained in Form 6 "which is factually inapplicable to such elector", and that an appropriate form/declaration be prescribed for inclusion of previously enrolled electors.

Form 6 is an application through which an eligible person seeks inclusion in the electoral roll.

"The present application raises the issue arising from the mechanism prescribed for re-inclusion of previously enrolled electors whose names have been omitted from the electoral roll pursuant to the SIR in the NCT of Delhi," the application said.

It also sought a direction to the poll panel not to reject an otherwise maintainable claim for inclusion or restoration solely on the grounds that the applicant has not furnished the additional SIR declaration form.

While hearing the main petition on September 22, the apex court had told the EC that notices under the SIR exercise in Delhi were going to people "almost mechanically" and it should look for some additional safeguards.

It had told the poll panel that the basis for identifying a "logical discrepancy" required clarification.

On August 31, the poll panel published a draft electoral rolls under which 47 lakh voters were deleted from the list of 1.45 crore total voters in Delhi.

The poll panel had said more than 43.32 lakh voters were found to have shifted or were absent during the SIR, over 2.82 lakh voters were found to have died, while more than 1.41 lakh were enrolled at multiple places.