Law mandates sharing of draft roll details only with political parties, EC tells SC

NEW DELHI: Election Commission on Sunday informed Supreme Court that there was no provision in the Representation of the People Act or relevant rules mandating sharing details of preparation, publication or names of people deleted from the draft electoral roll with anyone, including petitioners before SC, except political parties .

"The statutory framework does not require EC to prepare or share any separate list of names of people not included in the draft electoral rolls, or publish the reasons for non-inclusion of anyone in the draft electoral rolls for any reason," EC said in response to the demand by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms to specify the names of approximately 65 lakh voters deleted in the draft list for Bihar after special intensive revision (SIR) of the state's electoral roll.

Turning to the petitioner's conduct, EC said, "The petitioner's (ADR) approach is consistent with its earlier attempts to malign EC by building false narratives on digital, print and social media. Such attempts should be appropriately dealt with by SC, and heavy costs should be imposed for the petitioner's attempts to deliberately mislead SC."

EC said exclusion of a name from the draft voter list did not mean it was deleted from the electoral roll.

"The draft roll simply shows that the duly filled enumeration form of existing electors has been received during the enumeration phase. But, on account of human involvement in execution of this exercise of scale, there is always a possibility that an exclusion or inclusion might surface due to inadvertence or error," it said.

Informing SC that the draft electoral roll had been shared with political parties as statutorily mandated so as to ensure all attempts are made to reach out to individuals and no eligible voter is left out, EC said, "As neither the law nor guidelines provide for preparation or sharing of any such list of previous electors whose enumeration form is not received for any reason during the enumeration phase, no such list can be sought by the petition as a matter of right."

On Aug 7, booth level officers again held polling station-level meetings with booth level agents (BLAs) appointed by political parties and others, and read out and shared the list of electors whose name could not be included on the draft electoral roll, and appeals were made to BLAs and others to reach out to them so that no eligible voter was left out, it said.

EC said the provision for non-supply of reason for deletion of names from the voter list was in sync with the statutory provision, which mandates that no inquiry is to be conducted for inclusion of a persons' name in the draft electoral roll on acceptance of his/her enumeration form. Those persons whose names were not included on the voter list can apply for inclusion till Sept 1, it said.

EC said prior to publication of the draft electoral roll, it had directed chief electoral officer, district electoral officers, electoral registration officers and booth level officers to share with political parties the booth level list of individuals whose enumeration forms were not received, and suggested that they seek assistance from political parties to reach out to those who had not submitted requisite forms.

"The final roll, which will be published after the present SIR exercise is completed, and claims and objections are decided, will contain all such information based on the disposal of claims and objections. Thus, the allegation of the petitioner that there is deviation from the past practice in this regard, is false, misconceived, erroneous, unfounded and misleading," EC said.