Election Commission of India's (ECI's) June 24 order to conduct a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar is outrageous. The exercise's timing – to be completed in a period of one month, that too four months ahead of elections for the state assembly – has raised serious doubts about ECI's neutral functioning. Furthermore, the order for completing the near-impossible task of covering eight crore voters was implemented a day after the order was issued.

NRC Through Backdoor

The order says that those not included in the 2003 electoral roll would have to provide documentary proof which, inter alia, includes that they and their parents are citizens of India. Those unable to submit such evidence and other documents listed by the ECI could be referred to the Citizens’ Tribunal as suspected foreign nationals.

It is like implementing the NRC (National Register of Citizens) through the backdoor. Former chief election commissioner Ashok Lavasa, while questioning the ECI for abandoning its “time-tested procedure” for conducting SIRs, said that the method chosen by it would deprive a vast number of citizens of their right to vote and their status as citizens of India “where no citizenship document is issued by the government.”

The ECI's move to ask a section of eligible voters to first prove their citizenship status before their inclusion in the electoral roll has confounded many. 

In the face of public outcry and against the exercise, the ECI is sending conflicting messages. The Electoral Officer of Bihar in a newspaper ad appealed that eligible voters should fill up the forms distributed to them and submit the required documents later. In contrast, CEC Gyanesh Kumar on June 6 said that SIR was being conducted without any change in instructions. Such contradictory signals seem suspicious, especially when the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear several petitions against the SIR on July 10.

Ambedkar’s vision

Against this backdrop, it is salutary to understand the legislative intent of the Constituent Assembly and the vision of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar concerning the preparation of electoral rolls. Ambedkar referred to complaints received by the drafting committee regarding the arbitrary deletion and addition of voters to states' electoral rolls because the highly-placed functionaries of the states displayed bias on cultural, linguistic or racial grounds.

Ambedkar, therefore, dispensed with the idea of establishing State Election Commissions and hoped that ECI as an all India entity and independent body would act free from partiality and prejudice to prepare those rolls for states.

On June 15, 1949, Ambedkar while moving Article 289 of the draft Constitution (corresponding Article in the Constitution is 324) in the Constituent Assembly concerning establishment of ECI as an independent institution remarked that the “franchise is a most fundamental thing in a democracy”. “No person who is entitled to be brought into the electoral rolls on the grounds which we have already mentioned in our Constitution, namely, an adult of 21 years of age, should be excluded merely as a result of the prejudice of a local government, or the whim of an officer. That would cut at the very root of democratic government,” he added

Therefore, he pleaded that "...a Central Election Commission … alone would ….issue directives to returning officers….and others engaged in the preparation and revision of electoral rolls so that no injustice may be done to any citizen in India, who under this Constitution is entitled to be brought on the electoral rolls”.

On June 16, 1949, Hridaya Nath Kunjru while participating in the discussion supported Ambedkar’s vision and said, “We are anxious, sir, that the preparation of the electoral rolls and the conduct of elections should be entrusted to people who are free from political bias and whose impartially can be relied upon in all circumstances."

That vision was embodied in Article 324 and 325 of the Constitution dealing with, among others, preparation of electoral rolls without any bias based on religion, race, caste or sex.

Questions on ECI's integrity

It is tragic that in the last 11 years under the Modi regime, the independence of the ECI in preparing electoral rolls has been seriously compromised. For instance, it has failed to answer convincingly how five months before the elections to the Maharashtra Assembly in 2024, 41 lakh voters were added to the electoral roll of the state in contrast to the addition of 31 lakh voters in the preceding five years.

Now the SIR in Bihar has generated fear and apprehension that it would not just delete voters from its electoral roll but also make them lose their status as citizens of India.

The documents asked under the exercise do not include the voter ID, Aadhar card and other papers usually needed to prepare electoral rolls in the past. A host of other documents requested by the ECI in Bihar include, among others, identity card/ pension payment papers issued to government/ PSU employees , educational certificates issued by recognised entities, permanent residence certificates, forest right certificates, caste certificates, passports and birth certificates.

Most of these documents are not available with millions of voters belonging to poorer sections of society, who cut across barriers of religion and caste. The manner in which SIR is being conducted in Bihar would lead to exclusion of the poorer and under-privileged sections, majority of Muslims and the people placed in the lower end of the caste hierarchy.

In 2023 a five judge bench of the Supreme Court in Anoop Baranwala vs Union of India held that “…the right to vote is not merely a constitutional right, but a component of Part III of the Constitution (Fundamental Rights) as well.” It went on to observe, “In history, the right to vote was denied to women and those were socially oppressed. Our Constitution took a visionary step by extending franchise to everyone.” While noting that the right to vote is a question of constitutional as well as fundamental rights, the apex court wanted to ensure that the working of the Election Commission under Article 324 facilitates the protection of people’s voting rights.

Mahatma Gandhi in 1931 had said, "Adult suffrage is necessary for more reasons than one; and one of the decisive reasons for me is that it enables one to satisfy the reasonable aspirations, not only of Mussalmans but also of the so-called untouchables, of Christians, of labourers, and of all classes".

Those seminal utterances flagged the idea that universal suffrage remained a unifying force in bringing together people regardless of their faith, castes and economic status.

The SIR in contrast is going to tear the society apart, exclude a large number of people from electoral rolls and rob them of their status as citizens of India.

S.N. Sahu served as Officer on Special Duty to President of India K.R. Narayanan.

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