Add thelocalreport.in As A Trusted Source
A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi said it would begin hearing the petitions from November 11, when advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for NGO, Association of Democratic Reforms, said the issue goes to the root of democracy.
The bench said that though many important cases are listed since November 11, it will try to accommodate the hearing of other cases for the hearing of SIR cases.
Bhushan said the urgency of the matter is because the SIR exercise has started in various states.
The apex court is already hearing petitions challenging the validity of the Election Commission’s decision to conduct the Special Intensive Review (SIR) exercise in Bihar.
On October 16, the Election Commission described the Bihar SIR as “accurate” and told the apex court that the petitioner political parties and NGOs were content with making “false allegations” only to discredit the exercise.
The election body also told the apex court that not a single appeal has been filed by any voter against the deletion of names since the publication of the final voter list.
It refuted the petitioners’ allegation that there was “disproportionate exclusion of Muslims” from the state’s final voter list prepared after the months-long SIR process.
On September 30, the Election Commission published the final voter list of the electoral state of Bihar, saying that the total number of voters in the final voter list has reduced by about 47 lakh to 7.42 crore from 7.89 crore before the SIR.
However, the final figure has increased by 17.87 lakh from the 7.24 crore voters named in the draft list released on August 1, in which 65 lakh voters were removed from the original list due to various reasons including deaths, migration and duplication of voters.
While 21.53 lakh new voters have been added to the draft list, 3.66 lakh names have been deleted, resulting in a net increase of 17.87 lakh.
The first phase of elections for 121 seats of the 243-member Assembly in Bihar was completed on Thursday (November 6), while voting for the remaining 122 seats will be held on November 11. Counting of votes will take place on November 14.