Bengaluru Form 7 Row: FIR Filed Over Voter Deletion Bid, Congress Targets BJP

Supreme Court judge Justice Ujjal Bhuyan has stressed that the right to vote forms the foundation of free and fair elections, stating that voter names cannot be deleted without notice, except in the case of deceased individuals. Reacting to the ongoing Special Intensive Revision row during an address at NALSAR University of Law, Justice Bhuyan noted that the Constitution of India does not create two classes of citizens and that detaching voting rights from citizenship is like taking the soul from the body.

He observed that wholesale disenfranchisement rendering millions of citizens without voting rights is intrinsically arbitrary and violative of Articles 14 and 326. While the judge is not presiding over the Special Intensive Revision petitions before the apex court, his remarks come as Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar faces judicial scrutiny. Several petitions before the Supreme Court seek the suspension of the Chief Election Commissioner, the quashing of unilateral decisions, a judicial probe into the revision process, and a forensic audit of election commission software systems.