Former EC Questions Legality Of SIR Procedures, Seeks Clarity On Form 6 Changes

Former Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa on Wednesday raised questions over the legality of some procedures used in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. He asked the Election Commission to clarify whether changes to Form 6 and the ERO-Net system followed due process.

His comments landed as Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had objected 14 times in the past 10 months to decisions and orders tied to the SIR exercise. Those objections reportedly covered changes to Form 6, which is used to register new voters, and the move to centralise the electoral roll database. Lavasa raised the matter in an interview with India Today on Wednesday.

Lavasa said those questions deserved scrutiny regardless of whether all three commissioners had agreed to the changes. He said the main issue was whether due process was followed and whether EROs retained their statutory authority.

Form 6 Changes

Lavasa framed the legal issue directly. "Even if all the three commissioners agreed, was it legal for them to change the Form 6 without going through the necessary approval process? That is a question which is open," he told India Today.

He also questioned whether the ERO-Net system had curtailed the statutory powers of Electoral Registration Officers (EROs), who decide whether names are added to or removed from electoral rolls. His concern was less about the software itself and more about whether a digital setup had narrowed an officer's legal powers.

Lavasa pointed to a reported example from Goa. In that case, an ERO could not include 97 eligible people in the final roll even after satisfying himself about their eligibility. "If the ERO felt constrained that he could not admit 97 people in spite of being sure about their eligibility, then that certainly is a problem," he said.

Centralised Roll Database

Lavasa said centralisation was not an issue on its own. He said a centralised electoral roll database could work if EROs continued to exercise their lawful powers within their jurisdiction.

"Election Commission of India has no jurisdiction in deciding on the fate of an elector, whether he should be in or out. Therefore, it is the ERO which exercises the entire jurisdiction," he said. He argued that the core question was whether roll decisions remained with the legally authorised officer under law.

He then spelled out the condition he saw as necessary for the system to function lawfully. "The legally authorised person must have access to his limited jurisdiction, so that he can modify the electoral roll according to law," Lavasa said.

Dissent And Oversight

Lavasa distinguished disagreement from formal dissent. On the reported objections by Sandhu and Joshi, he said differences inside the poll panel did not automatically amount to dissent, echoing the Election Commission's remarks at a press conference shortly before.

Lavasa said the poll panel should release the complete trail of those exchanges. He wanted clarity on whether Sandhu and Joshi backed the same stand on each issue, whether the Commission weighed their views and whether they finally accepted the decisions or were overruled. "If an opinion has been expressed by somebody in a communication, the Election Commission took note of that before arriving at a decision, that is for the Election Commission to explain by giving full facts and record," he said.

He also described what he considers dissent before the Commission. "Dissent is when some agenda has been put up before the Commission. Two persons have one view and one person has another view. That is dissent," he said.

Lavasa also asked why an Election Commissioner would write to the Cabinet Secretary on issues related to the poll panel's internal functioning, saying the Election Commission should explain what led to such a communication. "There have to be checks and balances," Lavasa said, adding that an additional layer of oversight would strengthen accountability and supervision.

The Election Commission has maintained that its decisions, including those related to SIR, were unanimous and that individual communications or differences of opinion should not be treated as institutional dissent. Lavasa said the matter could not be assessed conclusively without the full records. "All these things call for a lot of clarification to be given," he said.