"Worst attack on Constitution": INDIA bloc delegation meets with ECI regarding SIR in Bihar

New Delhi [India], July 3 (ANI): A delegation of INDIA bloc leaders from 11 political parties met with the Election Commission of India (ECI) in the national capital on Wednesday to register their opposition to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls currently underway in Bihar, calling it the "worst attack on the basic structure of the Constitution."
Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi, part of the delegation that met Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi, questioned the timing of the SIR exercise, noting that it is being carried out only months before the upcoming Assembly elections.
"Firstly, the last revision was in 2003. For 22 years, more than four of five Bihar elections have happened. Were all those elections faulty?... Secondly the Special Intensive Revision which was held in 2003, was held one year before the Lok Sabha Elections, two years before the Assembly election. Today you are having in July, a maximum period of one or two months for an electoral revision exercise of the second most largest electoral populated state in India, Bihar...You want to have it in one and a half to two months," the Congress leader told reporters after the meeting.
Representatives of the Communist Party of India, CPI (Marxist-Leninist), Samajwadi Party, Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar), Rashtriya Janata Dal, Congress and other parties were present.
Singhvi warned that such a rushed revision process could distort the electoral rolls and called it a direct threat to constitutional democracy.
"This enfranchisement is the worst attack on the basic structure of the Constitution. Today, every word counts, even if you wrongfully delete or wrongfully add a single voter, it is creating a non-level playing field that affects democracy and elections. This violates the basic structure of the Constitution," Singhvi added.
The ECI has claimed that the SIR is only meant to verify voters and to identify any 'ineligible voters' ahead of the Assembly elections which are expected to be held later this year in Bihar. However, multiple political parties part of the Opposition, including Congress and Bihar's Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has raised objected to the exercise, claiming that it will be used to deny people their constitutional rights.
Singhvi also raised objections to how the meeting was conducted, stating that new restrictions on who could attend were introduced without precedent.
"For the first time we were told rules for going inside. This is the first time we were told that only the heads or chairpersons of parties can go in. This is not possible or practical, this has not happened before. I have been part of multiple delegations before. This restriction being put in makes sure that a conversation which is expected to happen in a democracy between political parties' representatives and the Election Commission does not happen," he said.
He added that senior Congress leaders Pawan Khera, Jairam Ramesh, and Akhilesh Pratap Singh were among those made to wait outside during the meeting.
Meanwhile, RJD MP Manoj Jha, who was also part of the delegation, called the SIR a "conspiracy" to remove the people of Bihar, and said that most people might not have the required documentation to keep one's name in the electoral rolls.

"We all have kept the worry of Bihar in front of them...I have handed over to them the letter of the RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav. This is a conspiracy to evict people...If the purpose of any exercise is exclusion instead of inclusion, then what can we say...They had no answer when we asked that the exercise (Special Intensive Revision), which had not been done in 22 years, why is being done now?... The documents that are important for proving eligibility, most people don't have them," Jha said during the press conference.
Communist Party of India's (CPI) General Secretary D Raja also said that the poll panel should consider the possibility of heavy rains, floods and other natural calamities during the season making the verification exercise challenging.

"We went there to discuss the problems involved in holding Bihar elections because there is an exercise which has been initiated, started by the Election Commission, that is Special Intensive Revision. We asked the Election Commission to postpone that SIR because Bihar will face floods, heavy rains and natural calamities that should be taken into consideration," Raja told ANI.
He mentioned that there was a demand to postpone the SIR and conduct the assembly elections based on the 2024 Lok Sabha electoral rolls.
NCP (SCP) leader and Member of Parliament Fouzia Khan said that the poll panel is dismissing the concerns of the migrants of Bihar.

"Election Commission is not willing to consider the concerns of Bihar's migrants, they do not live in ordinary houses. We feel that in the name of strengthening democracy whether the death of it does not happen, that is the question. If crores of people can be denied voting then where does the democracy stand?" the NCP (SCP) leader told ANI.
In a post on X following the meeting, the Election Commission stated that all concerns raised by party representatives were addressed, and the SIR was being conducted in accordance with legal provisions.
"Commission stated that SIR is being conducted in accordance with provisions of Article 326,RP Act 1950 & instructions issued on 24.06.2025 Party representatives raised concerns related to SIR. Each concern which was raised by any member of PP was fully addressed by Commission," the EC's post read.
The Bihar Legislative Assembly elections are expected to be held later this year, however no official date has been announced by the ECI as of yet. (ANI)