An all-party meeting held Wednesday decided to legally challenge the implementation of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Kerala.
This comes after all parties except for the Bharatiya Janata Party endorsed the government’s decision at a meeting that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan chaired.
According to an official statement after the meeting, Vijayan informed participants that the government would seek legal opinion on challenging the SIR, considering the impending local body elections in the state. Since the electoral rolls prepared for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections are currently valid, conducting the SIR using the 2002 voters’ list as the base document is “unscientific”, the statement said.
Representatives of all parties except the BJP expressed concern over using the 2002 rolls as the base. Opposition Leader V D Satheesan told the meeting that if the state government approaches the Supreme Court against the SIR, the Opposition will implead in the matter. Communist Party of India (Marxist) State Secretary M V Govindan told the media that the conduct of the SIR is “anti-constitutional and anti-democratic.”
The Election Commission of India has already begun the SIR in Kerala. Last month, the state legislative assembly passed a unanimous resolution against it, saying the process was aimed at indirectly implementing the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
“In what manner those who attempt to dust off the Citizenship Amendment Act will use the SIR will be a challenge faced by democracy. The EC should desist from such actions that will violate fundamental rights, and the revision of the voters’ roll should be conducted in a transparent manner,” the resolution said.
Chief Electoral Officer of Kerala Dr Rathan U Kelkar had also urged the ECI to postpone the process in view of the upcoming local body elections.
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