SC seeks Assam electoral roll revision details for 3 years

New Delhi, March 12 (IANS) The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Election Commission (EC) to furnish the data on addition and deletion of voters from Assam electoral rolls, revised in January 2017, 2018 and 2019.

The electoral rolls are revised every year in January.

Seeking the data for three years on addition and deletion in the electoral rolls, the Bench, comprising Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice Deepak Gupta and Justice Sanjiv Khanna, also sought to know the steps the poll panel would take about those whose name are in the electoral rolls but not in the final National Register of Citizens (NRC), to be released on July 31, 2019.

The EC Secretary who appeared before the court in person said updating electoral rolls was a continuous process.

The top court at the last hearing on March 3 had directed personal appearance of the Election Commission's secretary, noting despite its notice, none had appeared on behalf of the poll panel.

The court was hearing a plea by Gopal Seth and others. They contended that their names had been deleted from the electoral rolls merely because they were not included in the draft NRC, which was published on June 30, 2018.

Rejecting the claim, senior counsel Vikas Singh, appearing for the EC, said the petitioners' names were very much in electoral rolls and none of the names have been deleted from the rolls merely because they did not figure in the NRC.

"We have not deleted from the electoral rolls any name, which does not figure in the NRC," Singh said asserting such claims would cause a "huge amount of adverse publicity for the EC".

However, the counsel Pijush K. Roy appearing for petitioner Seth said the Commission was not aware of the ground situation in Assam.