India’s Supreme Court (SC) on Monday allowed West Bengal’s All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) to file fresh applications challenging the revision of voter lists carried out by federal electoral authorities, a process the party claims affected recent local election outcomes in the state.
The court’s observation came during a hearing in which senior advocate Kalyan Banerjee, appearing for TMC, argued that in several constituencies the winning margins were smaller than the number of voters whose names had been deleted from the electoral rolls. He alleged that such deletions significantly influenced results in multiple seats.
Kalyan Banerjee told the bench that in at least 31 constituencies, the margin of defeat or victory was lower than the number of excluded voters. In one case, he cited a candidate losing by 862 votes while 5,432 names had been removed from the voter list. He also claimed that nearly 35 lakh appeals related to voter deletions were pending before appellate tribunals, with the overall electoral margin between major parties reaching around 32 lakh votes.
The bench, including Justice Bagchi, said that former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and others were free to file independent interlocutory applications if they believed the voter list revision had materially affected election results.
The Election Commission of India, however, opposed the submissions, arguing that the proper legal remedy would be through election petitions and that it could not be held directly accountable for disputes arising from voter list revisions and related appeals.
The SC also noted concerns over delays in adjudicating appeals related to voter deletions, with lawyers indicating that tribunals could take several years to complete the process. The court said priority should be given to expeditious resolution and sought updated timelines from judicial authorities.
