New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday directed appellate tribunals in West Bengal to grant out-of-turn hearings to those seeking urgent relief over deletion of names from voter lists following the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The direction came as a Bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, along with Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi, heard a batch of petitions, including one linked to the Mamata Banerjee government over the electoral roll revision.
At the outset, the Chief Justice praised the record voter turnout in the first phase of the West Bengal Assembly elections, where 92.72 per cent polling was recorded across 152 constituencies.
“As a citizen of India, I was very happy to see the voting percentage. When people exercise the right to vote, it strengthens democracy,” the CJI observed.
The court asked those excluded from voter rolls to approach the 19 court-appointed appellate tribunals for redress and directed these bodies to prioritise urgent cases involving requests for inclusion in the voter list.
The bench also granted liberty to aggrieved persons to approach the Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court, both administratively and judicially, for resolution of pending grievances.
In its order, the court noted that while most issues had already been addressed in its April 13 ruling, fresh concerns could continue to arise on a daily basis and may require intervention from either the High Court or the appellate tribunals.
The top court also reiterated its earlier direction that those whose appeals were allowed before April 21 or April 27 must be permitted to vote in the respective phases of polling. However, it clarified that mere pendency of an appeal does not automatically grant voting rights.
The issue stems from the massive revision exercise under which nearly 60 lakh claims and objections were raised after deletions from electoral rolls. Around 700 judicial officers from West Bengal, Odisha and Jharkhand were deployed to handle the caseload, while 19 special tribunals were later constituted to hear appeals.
During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta welcomed the high turnout and credited central forces for helping ensure peaceful polling in a state long associated with election violence.
Senior advocate and TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee also highlighted that only a small fraction of appeals had been decided so far, despite lakhs awaiting hearings, and said many voters had travelled from across the country to cast ballots fearing removal from electoral rolls.
The court said the broader question concerning the right to remain on electoral rolls would be examined at a later stage.
