Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: In an unprecedented order, the Supreme Court on February 20 directed deployment of serving as well as retired judicial officers to oversee adjudication of claims and objections arising from the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the poll-bound West Bengal. A Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipin Pancholi observed that a trust deficit between the West Bengal government and the Election Commission of India (ECI) had stalled the SIR exercise at a crucial stage.
“There is an unfortunate blame game of allegations and counter-allegations which shows trust deficit between two constitutional functionaries,” the apex court said.
Noting that thousands of voters who received notices under the “logical discrepancy list” had already submitted documents supporting their inclusion in electoral rolls, the CJI Kant-led Bench stressed these claims now required a fair adjudication.
The Supreme Court said that in view of the “extraordinary circumstances”, it was left with little option but to involve the judiciary to ensure fairness and completion of the revision exercise. It requested the Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court to spare serving judicial officers along with retired officers in the rank of Additional District Judge or District Judge to assist in disposal and reconsideration of pending claims across districts.
“In order to ensure fairness in adjudication of genuineness of documents submitted and consequent inclusion or exclusion in voter list, we are left with hardly any other option but to request the Chief Justice of the High Court of Calcutta to spare some serving judicial officers along with some former judicial officers,” the CJI Kant-led Bench ordered.
As per the apex court order, each judicial officer will be assisted by officials deputed by the ECI as well as the West Bengal government. The apex court also allowed publication of the final electoral roll on the scheduled date of February 28 for the portion of the exercise already completed, permitting the ECI to publish supplementary voter lists thereafter.
