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India Supreme Court upholds special voter roll revision, backs citizenship checks
The apex court on Wednesday said the electoral roll cleansing drive was meant to tackle bogus, duplicate voting and to bar ineligible voters, including the dead and illegal immigrants
- PUBLISHED: Wed 27 May 2026, 12:34 PM
The Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that the Election Commission of India (ECI) had the authority to conduct the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise and upheld its constitutional validity. It also ruled that the ECI had the power to scrutinise citizenship during the exercise. SIR satisfies the test of proportionately and was “not manifestly excessive,” it said.
India’s apex court also said the roll revision undertaken by the ECI was “legally tenable” and it did not violate the Representation of People Act by ordering the exercise in Bihar.
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The refusal of the ECI to include names did not mean it was stripping people of their citizenship, said the court. It also asserted that the SIR had a direct nexus with free and fair election.
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Referring to ECI’s moves in Bihar, the court said it was an electoral roll cleansing drive to tackle bogus, duplicate voting and to bar ineligible voters, including the dead and illegal immigrants.
“Having regard to the nature of the problem sought to be addressed, the scale of the exercise undertaken and the procedural safeguards incorporated during its implementation, the measures adopted by the Commission cannot be said to be disproportionate to the objective sought to be achieved,” said the Supreme Court.
Disenfranchising marginalised voters
The petitioners in the case had challenged the legality of the SIR, claiming that it went beyond the powers granted to it by the Indian constitution and the law. They claimed that the move risked disenfranchising genuine voters, especially the marginalised and migrant communities, many of who lacked documentary evidence.
The Supreme Court dismissed the petitioners’ view that the SIR was a surreptitious, backdoor move to screen citizens in the name of cleaning the electoral rolls of aliens.
It said that if the ECI felt that a person did not have the necessary documents, it could forward the case to the government for adjudication under the Citizenship Act.
It also felt that the range of indicative documents, including Aadhaar, was reasonable and part of a structured system set up for verifying voters. It also noted that any decision taken during the SIR process was subject to judicial review.
The ECI told the court that the revision was needed to ensure the purity of electoral rolls and prevent duplication or the inclusion of ineligible voters. The issue cropped up last June after the ECI launched the exercise in Bihar and later extended it to West Bengal, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The third and final phase of SIR is currently being done in 16 states and three union territories.
