The Supreme Court on Friday issued fresh notices to the Election Commission on a batch of petitions challenging the ongoing pan-India SIR exercise.
The court agreed to hear on November 6 the Kerala government’s petition seeking postponement of the SIR on the ground that the state was preoccupied with local body polls, to be held on December 9 and 11.
The notices were issued on petitions filed by the Kerala government, the Indian Union Muslim League’s state unit, the CPM, the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee and the Congress MP of Barabanki in Uttar Pradesh, Tanuj Punia.
The Kerala government has told the court that for now, it is seeking the deferment of the SIR in the state in view of the local body elections. The IUML has made a similar plea. Both petitions will be taken up for hearing on November 26, while the rest of the pleas, which have sought quashing of the entire SIR drive, will be heard in the second week of December.
The petitions allege that the SIR is being carried out in an arbitrary manner and will result in the disenfranchisement of lakhs of voters.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing the Kerala government, told a bench of Justice Surya Kant, Justice S.V.N. Bhati and Justice Joymalya Bagchi that the local body polls would be held on December 9 and 11, and the SIR exercise would put tremendous pressure on government officials who were already on election duty.
Justice Kant, heading the bench, said that while the other batch of petitions would be taken up for hearing in the second week of December, the applications by the Kerala government and the IUML seeking deferment of the SIR would be heard on November 26.
On November 11, a bench of Justice Kant and Justice Bagchi had issued notice to the EC on another batch of petitions filed by various political parties challenging the panel’s decision to conduct a countrywide SIR on the lines of the Bihar drive.
The apex court had restrained all high courts from dealing with the SIR issue since it was seized of the matter. It asked the high courts to keep in abeyance all pending petitions related to the SIR till the top court decided the issue.
The bench had also sought the response of the EC on an additional affidavit filed by the Association for Democratic Reforms seeking, among other things, a direction that the poll panel has no jurisdiction to deal with the citizenship claims of individuals.
The Bengal Congress, DMK and the Trinamool Congress have moved the Supreme Court seeking the quashing of the SIR notification of October 27 for the conduct of the drive in multiple states and Union Territories.