Assam Oppn leader writes to CJI on voter list revision

Guwahati: Assam's leader of the Opposition, Debabrata Saikia of Congress, has written to the Chief Justice of India, requesting him to take suo motu cognisance of what he alleged as misuse of the special revision (SR) of electoral rolls in the state.

Congress had earlier claimed bulk submission of Form-7 and removal of the names of permanent residents in the state from voter lists. Form-7 is used for raising objections to the inclusion of a name on the voter list, or deletion of one's own or another person's name.

The situation has moved beyond administrative lapses and assumed dimensions of a constitutional crisis, Saikia wrote in the letter dated January 28 and released to the media. The right to vote under Article 326 of the Constitution is being systematically undermined through executive interference, communal targeting and misuse of statutory procedures, he alleged.


According to him, repeated media briefings and public statements by chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma indicated that notices under SR were being selectively served on a particular community - the "Miya", or Bengali-origin Muslim, population - with an intent to "keep them under pressure", "make them suffer" and demonstrate "resistance" in Assam.

The CM has publicly stated that the government was "giving them trouble", and that the issuance of such notices, eviction drives and actions by border police formed part of a conscious and continuing policy decision, he alleged. According to Saikia, these statements amount to an open admission that SR and use of Form-7 were being employed not for their lawful purpose, but as instruments of intimidation, harassment and targeted disenfranchisement of a particular community.