Kerala High Court Refuses To Defer SIR, Says State May Approach Supreme Court

Justice V G Arun said similar matters are already pending before the Supreme Court and hence, judicial discipline demands the High Court to refrain from hearing the matter.

"Judicial discipline and comity also require this Court to refrain from entertaining the writ petition. For the aforementioned reasons, the writ petition is closed, leaving it open to the petitioner to move the Supreme Court or to approach this Court depending on the outcome of the petitions pending before the SC," the order states.

The State had prayed for deferring the SIR till 21 December, 2025, that is till the completion of the process of 2025 general elections to LSGIs in the State.

It had argued that undertaking SIR simultaneously with the LSGI election would affect the smooth conduct of the LSGI election.

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on the other hand argued that more than half of the exercise (SIR) is already over and any intervention at this stage would be restraining the process in the middle of the exercise.

The General elections to the LSGIs in the State is scheduled to be conducted on 9 and 11 December, 2025 in two phases, with counting scheduled to be held on 13 December and the last date for completion of election is 18 December, 2025.

ECI has issued order directing conduct of SIR in Kerala which requires distribution of such enumeration forms to electors by Booth Level Officers (BLOs), inclusion of electors in the draft rolls by Electoral Registration Officers (ERO) and Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AERO), decision by EROs/AEROs regarding the inclusion or exclusion of electors in the electoral rolls, pre-enumeration training of BLOs, EROs and AEROs and hearing of appeals against such decisions by EROs/AEROs, by District Magistrates.

According to the schedule of SIR, the enumeration by BLOs must be complete by December 4, 2025, submission of details is scheduled on December 9 and final publication of electoral rolls is scheduled on February 7, 2026.

The State submitted that the BLO's, EROs/AEROs for SIR were precisely the same officials who are to be deployed for duties in connection with LSGI elections. Even though the order for conduct of SIR states an exception for those officers engaged by State Election Commission for LSGI elections, the State stated that since the pool of trained and election experienced staff is finite and most such officers fall into both buckets, it might result in an administrative impasse in the State.

The State also stated that there is no emergent necessity to carry out SIR in State since the general elections to the State Legislative Assembly must be completed only before 24 May, 2026 since the first Session of the present assembly commenced only on 24 May, 2021.

Case Title: State of Kerala v. The Election Commission of India and Ors.

Case No: WP(C) 42591/2025

Citation: 2025 LiveLaw (Ker) 739