The Supreme Court heard the West Bengal Special Intensive Revision (SIR) case on Wednesday. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee was also present with her lawyers. She alleged that West Bengal is being targeted by the Election Commission, and that a process that should take two years is being rushed through in three months.
After the hearing, the bench headed by CJI Surya Kant stated that genuine voters should remain on the electoral roll. The bench sought a response from the Election Commission and the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal by February 9th on Mamata's petition.
This was the first time in the history of the Supreme Court that a sitting Chief Minister of a state appeared in court to present their arguments. Usually, only the Chief Minister's lawyers or advisors appear in such cases.
Chief Minister Mamata's arguments…
West Bengal is being targeted. Why wasn't the same standard applied in Assam? We are not getting justice anywhere. I have written six letters to the Election Commission.
The Election Commission is not allowing Aadhaar cards. It is demanding other documents from voters for electoral roll revision. Many living people have been declared dead.
Courtroom LIVE…
Mamata's lawyer: More than 1.4 crore people have been issued notices to produce documents. The Supreme Court had directed that a list of reasonable discrepancies be displayed. Dewan pointed to the large number of pending applications and hearings, and the shortage of time.
Mamata's lawyer: People have been flagged for mapping discrepancies, but they have neither been personally informed nor told the reasons for their names being included in the list.
CJI: You want people to be informed of the reasons why their names were flagged. We agree with this. However, we have been told that the list is not the only mode of communication and individual notices are also being issued.
Mamata's lawyer: We have been given short notice. There are 11 days left to publish the final electoral roll data. The number of days left to complete the hearings is 4. The number of unmapped voters is 3.2 million. The LD post draft roll is 1.36 crore, which is 20% of the total voters.
ECI's lawyer Dwivedi: All notices have reasons. They were also allowed to bring authorized agents.
Mamata's lawyer: We are seeking a direction to the ECI to withdraw all notices that relate solely to name mismatches.
CJI: Are you referring to cases where a person writes ‘Dutta’… different people might use different spellings?
Mamata's lawyer: We have given real examples of Dutta, Ganguly, Roy.
CJI: Withdrawing the notices is somewhat impractical.
Mamata's lawyer: We estimate that in cases of logical discrepancies, approximately 70 lakh cases involve name mismatches and minor spelling differences. We have given examples of genuine voters.
CJI: There are spelling differences in the names.
Other lawyer: The 2002 voter list was in Bengali, so when it was translated, the names changed.
CJI: What is the solution?
Mamata's lawyer: Time is running out due to the name discrepancies. This should not be in the LD category.
CJI: If the state government provides a team of people who know Bengali and local dialects, and they verify and inform the Election Commission that the error is due to the local dialect, that would help.
Mamata Banerjee: Can I explain this? I am from the same state. Thank you very much to the Bench. The problem is that when everything is over, when we are not getting justice, when justice is weeping behind the door, then we thought we are not getting justice anywhere. I have written letters to the ECI. I am a very insignificant person. I am not fighting for my party.
CJI: The State of West Bengal has also filed a petition in its own right. One of the best lawyers of this court is there. Sibal is there. On January 19, Sibal highlighted the procedural difficulties in the state and the apprehension of disenfranchisement of the state's original inhabitants.
CJI: Additional issues are being raised in your petition today. The original inhabitants must remain. We appreciate that this issue has been raised in your petition that due to the local dialect, especially due to AI, if this is happening, we will find a solution. The genuine voter should not be excluded because of this.
ECI Counsel: We have not received the submissions. We will get instructions in a week.
CJI: A week will be too late. The entire process has a timeline. We have extended it by 10 days. Only 4 days are left. We cannot grant an extension.
Mamata Banerjee: SIR, the process is only for deletion. It's not just a mismatch in the title, sir. For example, without any planning, a daughter goes to her in-laws' house after marriage, why is she using her husband's title? That's also a mismatch.
CJI: That cannot be the case.
Mamata Banerjee: That's what they have done. Some daughters who went to their in-laws' houses have also had their names deleted. Sometimes poor people change their location. Due to a logical error, the people of Bengal are very happy that this court ordered that Aadhaar will be a document. In other states, domicile certificates and caste certificates are allowed. They have only targeted Bengal before the elections. Elections are going to be held in four states. What was the hurry to do this in three months after 24 years? When it is the harvesting season, when people are traveling. More than 100 people have died. BLOs have died, so many people are hospitalized. This is happening in Assam too.
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