India’s Election Commission was established on January 25, 1950, a day before India became a republic. This was a remarkable act of foresight. In a democracy, political parties compete for the support of the electorate to earn the right to govern. The contest must be free, fair and without fear or coercion. An independent Election […]
Right To Vote ≠ Right To Access: A Critique Of India’s Electoral Disability Regime
The author of this essay is Apoorva Singh (3rd year student from University of Petroleum and Energy Studies, Dehradun). ADR collaborated with the Centre for Human Rights and Disability Studies (CHRDS), Himachal Pradesh National Law University, Shimla, for the National Article Writing Competition on “Electoral Rights of Persons with Disabilities”. This essay has been published […]
No Voter Left Behind? The Illusion Of Independent Voting For Persons With Disabilities In Digital India
The authors of this essay are Ananya Singh and Divyansh Gera (2nd year students from Maharaja Surajmal Institute, New Delhi). ADR collaborated with the Centre for Human Rights and Disability Studies (CHRDS), Himachal Pradesh National Law University, Shimla, for the National Article Writing Competition on “Electoral Rights of Persons with Disabilities”. This essay has been […]
The Last Frontier Of Enfranchisement: Dismantling
The author of this essay is Rangoli Singh (2nd year student from Himachal Pradesh National Law University, Shimla). ADR collaborated with the Centre for Human Rights and Disability Studies (CHRDS), Himachal Pradesh National Law University, Shimla, for the National Article Writing Competition on “Electoral Rights of Persons with Disabilities”. This essay has been published under […]
The SIR verdict of the SC: A case of insufficient analysis
The recent judgment of the Supreme Court justifying the validity of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the case of Bihar and giving a clean chit to it appear to be deeply flawed. The controversy has been mostly restricted to debates about the resulting disenfranchisement of lakhs or crores of citizens and the manner of […]
Another law to target political opponents?
The 130th Amendment Bill’s framing betrays its political motive. Ajit Ranade on why it’s not about keeping criminals out of power In late February, a Delhi court discharged all 23 accused in the excise policy case, ruling there was “no overarching conspiracy or criminal intent” in the policy at issue. One of the accused had spent 530 […]
Fresh citizenship framework suggested amidst electoral roll concerns
The ongoing exercise of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls has raised serious concerns about the potential disenfranchisement of large numbers of citizens. In many instances, people are being asked to produce retrospective documents to establish their citizenship—documents that many genuine citizens are unable to provide. The challenge before policymakers is to identify prospective […]
SIR to be rejected: Civilisational tradition of this land to be respected
The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls is likely to start in several more States anytime soon. Citizens’ movements in these States need to demand a stop to the SIR and ask for measures that will ensure that no genuine voter is excluded. The experience of States where SIR has been conducted have thrown up the […]
India needs a door-to-door enumeration, not the SIR
The advantage of a fresh exercise is that it will not replicate the existing errors in the rolls and prevent inclusion and exclusion errors happening on a massive scale through the SIR It is a welcome measure that the Karnataka Cabinet has decided to ask the state Law Department to study the proposed Special Intensive […]
The way forward for determining citizenship
As there is no satisfactory means of proving a voter’s citizenship retrospectively, identify a prospective exercise to ensure that no genuine citizen gets excluded from the electoral roll or citizenship Not only civil society organisations even officialdom is now openly resisting the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. An assistant electoral registration officer in […]