Indian judge warns mass voter deletions would breach constitutional principles

Supreme Court Justice Ujjal Bhuyan has warned that a process removing voting rights from millions of Indian citizens would strike at the country’s constitutional order. His remarks came amid reports of large-scale deletions during the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. Speaking at an event at NALSAR University of Law, Justice Bhuyan said any process that disenfranchised millions would be intrinsically arbitrary.

He said no justification could make such a large-scale loss of voting rights acceptable. The judge said wholesale disenfranchisement would violate Articles 326 and 14 of the Constitution. Article 326 provides for elections based on adult suffrage, while Article 14 guarantees equality before the law and equal protection of the laws.

Justice Bhuyan said the Constitution did not recognise two classes of citizens—those who possessed voting rights and those who did not. He added that no authority could tamper with the constitutional guarantee of adult suffrage and that no court could condone such action. He described the right to vote as central to the Constitution’s basic structure and closely connected to citizenship.

Removing a citizen from the electoral roll, he said, would deprive that person of a fundamental means of participating in governance. Justice Bhuyan also referred to the Constituent Assembly’s decision to adopt universal adult franchise. He recalled B.R.

Ambedkar’s argument that adult suffrage should be placed directly in the Constitution rather than left solely to parliamentary legislation. The comments were made as allegations circulated that eligible voters were being removed during the Special Intensive Revision. The supplied material does not state the Election Commission’s response to the judge’s remarks or provide an official account of the number of deletions.

Justice Bhuyan said voting gave every adult citizen a voice in public affairs regardless of background or social position. He stressed that the constitutional framework did not permit citizens to be reduced to a lower status through the removal of their voting rights.