Voter List Integrity Under Question

India is a country governed by the Constitution and the independent judiciary has always tried to keep the flag of the Constitution high even in adverse circumstances. If we leave aside the 21-month emergency period, the judiciary of the country has shown the way to the entire country to follow the path of the Constitution in every situation and has proved that only the law that is equal for everyone will prevail in India. Our Constitution makers did not make the judiciary a part of the government so that every government elected at the political level rules only according to the Constitution and every government's final commitment is only towards the Constitution. Similarly, our Constitution makers did not make the Election Commission a part of the government and fixed its responsibility to protect the right to one vote of every citizen of India and ensure that the value of his one vote is universally equal.

The value of a laborer's vote should be the same as that of an industrialist's vote. Since independence, the Election Commission has been fulfilling this responsibility with full devotion, but at present, a big question mark has come up on its credibility when questions have been raised on the voter list prepared by it. In the intensive voter list revision work being done by the Election Commission in Bihar, names of 65 lakh voters have been removed. The Election Commission may have its own logic behind the reasons for removing these names, but the evidence of their being polluted was also exposed very soon by the opposition leader of the country, Mr. Rahul Gandhi. The main task of the Election Commission is to conduct clean and transparent elections in the country because it is through them that the foundation of democracy is laid in the country. When Baba Saheb Ambedkar was forming the Election Commission, his goal was political equality and freedom.

The Election Commission presented a fallacy by saying that the Aadhar card is not a proof of citizenship. This raised the question whether the Election Commission has the right to check the citizenship of any Indian. Obviously, the Constitution gives this right only to the Home Ministry. When any citizen of India writes before the Election Commission that he is a citizen of India, then his credibility can be legally checked only when someone else challenges his claim. Therefore, why can anyone have a problem with accepting the Aadhar card as a document for inclusion in the voter list. Therefore, the country's highest court, the Supreme Court, while hearing the petitions filed in this regard, was constantly saying that the Aadhar card should also be considered as the 12th document on showing which a citizen's name can be included in the voter list. But the shamelessness of the Election Commission was that it was not paying any attention to its suggestion or instruction. Therefore, finally on 8 September, the Supreme Court had to give a written order that the Aadhar card will be the 12th document. This has brought a sigh of relief to the countrymen as the Election Commission now wants to revise the voter list on the lines of Bihar in the entire country. However, the Supreme Court is yet to give its final decision on whether the Commission can do this or not. If seen carefully, the work of the Election Commission is to revise the voter lists before every election and when it keeps doing this work, then why does it need intensive revision? It can also be inferred that the Election Commission does not have faith in its own work.

The 2024 Lok Sabha elections were held across the country on the basis of the latest voter list of the Commission. But these are all subtle legal points whose twists can only be unraveled by senior and learned lawyers in the Supreme Court. At present, the issue of making Aadhaar card the 12th document is the main one. It can certainly be said that the judiciary of India knows the art of putting even any constitutional institution on the path of the Constitution. It is now the duty of the Election Commission to learn humility and discharge the responsibility that the Constitution makers have placed on its shoulders in a just manner.