The Supreme Court has once again made it clear that it is not the right of the Election Commission to decide citizenship. The Supreme Court made this comment during the hearing on West Bengal SIR dispute on Friday. The court said that the authority of the commission is limited only to the control and supervision of the voter list. Therefore there is no confusion in the legal position.
The court said that if a tribunal decides not to include a person’s name in the SIR list, then the Election Commission will have to send the matter to the concerned ministry for determining citizenship. Citizenship does not automatically expire just because your name is not in the voter list.
The Supreme Court, however, agreed to hear the petition in which it has been alleged that people whose names have been removed from the voter list are being deprived of the benefits of PDS, Annapurna Yojana and other government schemes. The next hearing of the case will be on August 25.
What happened in the hearing?
During the hearing in the court, Justice Bagchi said that it is not the constitutional right of the Election Commission to decide citizenship. The authority of the Commission is limited only to the control and supervision of the voter list, hence there is no confusion in the position of law. Senior advocate Gopal Shankaranarayan argued on behalf of the petitioner before the bench of CJI Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V Mohana. He said that the way the 19 appellate tribunals work is creating inconsistencies and delays at the practical level. The lawyer said that there are obstacles in the functioning of the tribunals and this is affecting the disposal of cases.
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