The Delhi High Court on Thursday held that a booth level agent (BLA) can only be made liable for verifying that the photograph in the enumeration form matches with the identity of electors in relation to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in the national capital. [2026 LiveLaw (Del) 810]

“In the opinion of this Court, BLA can only be made liable in terms of Section 31 of the Representation of People Act for information that can be verified by the BLA, i.e., the photograph in the enumeration form matches with the identity...” Justice Amit Bansal said.

The Court held that the BLA cannot be made liable for all the information, which is contained in the Enumeration Form as there is no way a BLA could be in a position to verify the same. It reasoned that such an information would be exclusively within the knowledge of the concerned elector.

The Court noted that ECI in its counter affidavit clearly stated that BLA does not participate in the statutory verification or in any other statutory process related to inclusion or exclusion in electoral rolls. It also maintained that verification of information is the job of the BLO, who conducts house to house verification.

"Once the responsibility of verification and undertaking has been entrusted to the BLOs, there exists no justification for requiring BLAs to furnish personal undertakings certifying the correctness of the particulars in the Enumeration Form," the Court said.

It held: "Therefore, the requirement of the BLA to give an undertaking with regard to veracity of the information contained in this Form is arbitrary and unreasonable. At best, the BLA can verify and give an undertaking in respect of the identity of the person submitting this form and whether the photograph pasted in the Form is that of the person whose Form it is."

The Court said so while deciding a plea challenging the guidelines issued by the Election Commission of India (ECI) concerning SIR exercise mandating BLAs of political parties to give a personal undertaking certifying that they have personally verified all details in the enumeration forms.

The plea has been filed by Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee (DPCC) President Devender Yadav and another individual.

It was Yadav's case that neither the Representation of the People Act (RP Act) nor the Registration of Electors Rules contain any provision empowering ECI to ask the representatives of political parties to give such an undertaking.

The plea stated that the requirement of a personal undertaking from BLAs is directly contrary to the statutory scheme of verification prescribed under Section 23 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, which mandates that the inclusion of any name in the electoral roll shall be made by the Electoral Registration Officer after “proper verification of facts in such manner as may be prescribed.”

It added that the prescribed manner of verification under the Rules is to be conducted by statutory officers, and not by private individuals or party representatives.

“The imposition of an undertaking of personal verification upon BLAs amounts to an unlawful delegation of a statutory function to private actors,” it said.

The plea sought quashing of SIR guidelines as well as a direction to the ECI to provide printed and soft copies of the electoral rolls of 2002 to them, including the 'Frozen Photo Electoral Roll' before enforcing SIR in the national capital to enable the petitioners' BLAs to effectively assist in the SIR process.

Title: DEVENDER YADAV & ANR v. ELECTION COMMISSION OF INDIA & ANR

Citation: 2026 LiveLaw (Del) 810

Case Number: W.P.(C) 11278/2026

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