Every single genuine person must remain on electoral roll, CJI tells West Bengal CM in Supreme Court

Also read: West Bengal SIR hearing highlights

Chief Minister Banerjee, who insisted on addressing the Bench, said she had only a “humble request”.

“Sir, save democracy,” Ms. Banerjee urged.

In what may be unprecedented in the annals of the top court, a sitting Chief Minister, who filed a writ petition in her own individual capacity, pushed her way to the front of the courtroom and requested the Bench to give her an opportunity to speak for “five minutes”.

‘May I explain, Sir?’

“May I explain, Sir? I belong to that State,” Ms. Banerjee addressed the Bench. “Is there any doubt about it, Madam?” Chief Justice Kant assented to her request.

Ms. Banerjee said she had moved the Supreme Court in her individual capacity as a citizen after her letters to the Election Commission (EC) as the Chief Minister had received no reply. She said she had come to the apex court “when everything is finished, when we are not getting justice anywhere”.

The Chief Minister said nearly 1.4 crore voters in West Bengal were excluded from the electoral roll for “logical discrepancies”. About 50% of them were purged due to minor mismatches or spelling variations in their names.

“EC won’t run away”

“For every problem there is a solution. We have to look for the solution so that no innocent citizen is left out. Every single genuine person must remain on the electoral roll… But may be because of the local dialect or due to the pronunciation, genuine voters are being left out. The EC will have to find out the solution. They will not like to run away from that responsibility. Due to these mistakes, genuine voters must not be excluded,” Chief Justice Kant assured.

Ms. Banerjee recounted how women who had married and not changed their surnames were ousted from the draft electoral rolls. Minor mismatches in names or surnames like ‘Roy’ and ‘Ray’ were enough for deletion.

“The SIR is a process of deletion and not inclusion,” the Chief Minister said.

At one point, the Chief Justice suggested having State officials conversant in the local dialect to help the EC with the names.

“Why Bengal, why not Assam?”

“But, Sir, what was the hurry to conduct this exercise after nearly 20 years when elections are near? Why are they targeting only Bengal? Why did they announce this exercise when people were busy with the festival and harvest seasons… Sir, more than 100 people have died, including booth-level officers… Tell me why Bengal has been targeted, why not Assam?” Ms. Banerjee persisted.

She said documents like Aadhaar, certificates of domicile, caste and panchayat residence were not accepted as stand-alone proof of identity during citizenship verification.

She termed the EC as the “WhatsApp Commission”, alleging the Constitutional body used the instant messaging platform to communicate critical instructions and warnings.

“Such casual communication channels for such a critical exercise strikes at the root of democracy… It is unheard of in the country since Independence. It reeks of arrogance and is devoid of legal legitimacy or authenticity,” Ms. Banerjee said.

She said the EC had appointed 8,100 ‘micro-observers’ in West Bengal to act as a “supreme authority” over the Electoral Registration Officers (EROs). “These micro-observers bulldoze the people of West Bengal,” Ms. Banerjee said.

Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, interjected for the EC, saying micro-observers were appointed as the State Government had not cooperated with a request to provide Class-II officers to fill up the ranks of EROs. “They (State) gave us Anganwadi workers instead,” Mr. Dwivedi said.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and senior advocate Dama Seshadhiri Naidu said the ECI, in turn, wanted to point out specific instances of hostility from the State Government.

Senior advocate Shyam Divan, representing Ms. Banerjee, along with senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, for the poet-writer Joy Goswami, said there were over a crore hearings still pending ahead of the February 7 deadline.

“This would mean 15.5 lakh hearings have to be held in a day. Completing more than one crore hearing before February 7 would be virtually impossible, keeping in mind the logistical challenges,” Mr. Divan submitted.

Issuing notice on Ms. Banerjee’s petition, the court scheduled the next hearing on February 9.

Published – February 04, 2026 09:28 pm IST