'Good Suggestion' : Supreme Court On Plea To Use De-Duplication Software To Detect Multiple Entries In Voters' List

The Supreme Court on Tuesday (November 11) orally endorsed the suggestion to use de-duplication software for identifying multiple entries of the same person in the voters' list.A bench comprising Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi was hearing an application filed by the Association for Democratic Reforms seeking certain directions to the Election Commission of India while it is conducting the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in many States.Advocate Prashant Bhushan, for the NGO, told the bench that there is a de-duplication software which the ECI can use to weed out multiple entries."That's a good suggestion; there should be no problem with that," Justice Kant said.Another direction sought in the application was to direct the ECI not to determine the citizenship of voters through SIR, on the ground the Election Commission does not have citizenship verification authority. "If they have power, they will determine. If not, they will not. This issue will arise in final matter," Justice Kant said.The next direction sought in the application was to direct the ECI to ensure that an acknowledgment slip is given to all voters who submit enumeration forms. "The forms are not being uploaded on websites. So people do not have proof that they have filed the enumeration form," Bhushan said.Next, Bhushan urged that the ECI should make available the 2002 electoral roll in a machine-readable form so that voters can easily search for the names of their parents in the 2002 roll. At this point, the bench referred to the 2018 order in the Kamal Nath case which held that the electoral rolls need not be furnished in a machine-readable form.Justice Bagchi said that the question of privacy and data protection was also involved, as making the list machine-readable may lead to "data-mining" by third parties."There's issue of collective protection of data of Indian citizens...data security. Data itself is valuable asset and ECI is holding in trust," Justice Bagchi said.Justice Bagchi suggested that there could be a mechanism by which the entry of each individual is protected by a password. "Instead, individual may be given password to verify data on encrypted database of ECI.""What is the problem in machine-readable format?If people with large computer resources can convert the list in machine-readable form, then what's the problem in ECI giving the list in that form?" Bhushan asked."You lock your house, but it can still be broken. Is it good reason to not lock it?" Justice Bagchi asked.Ultimately, the bench sought the ECI's response on the ADR's application. The bench also asked Bhushan to deliberate upon the suggestion to have a password-protected entry in the list.The Court will hear the matter on November 26 along with the other petitions challenging the SIR in West Bengal and Tamil Nadu.Case : Association for Democratic Reforms and Ors. v. Election Commission of India, W.P.(C) No. 640/2025

'Good Suggestion' : Supreme Court On Plea To Use De-Duplication Software To Detect Multiple Entries In Voters' List

Debby Jain

The Court also observed that making the voters' list in machine-readable form might compromise the privacy of individuals.

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