'Don't Doubt Judicial Officers': Supreme Court In Bengal vs Poll Body

The Election Commission has given a training module to judicial officers in West Bengal to help out with the special intensive revision (SIR) process in the state, the Mamata Banerjee government told the Supreme Court today, amid her government's friction with the EC.

The state government's comment came a week after the Supreme Court told the Calcutta High Court to appoint judicial officers for helping in carrying out the SIR exercise, noting an unfortunate blame game had been going on between the state government and the EC over the voter roll clean-up drive.

The judicial officers can look into claims and objections, the Supreme Court had said.

But friction between the Bengal government and the EC remained even after the Supreme Court's order on February 20.

In the hearing today before a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi, the Bengal government's lawyer Kapil Sibal alleged the EC has issued directions to the judicial officers to follow a certain training module.

"Something strange has happened. While your lordships passed the order that all the modalities will be settled by the Chief Justice (of the Calcutta High Court) and the committee, what they have done is, behind the back, they have issued directions to the judicial officers and issued a training module saying this is what they should accept and this is what they should not accept," Sibal said.

The Supreme Court, responding to this, said it knows its judicial officers well and they will not be "influenced by anything".

"Now don't doubt the judicial officers, they will decide. There has to be an end to this," Chief Justice Kant said.

Justice Bagchi added, "Who else other than the EC would give the training? We have made it clear what the documents are to be looked at. Our directions are clear; they cannot be overridden."

Sibal then alleged the EC told them domicile certification should not be accepted for SIR verification.

"If our orders cover such a document, it will be looked into," the Supreme Court said.

The Supreme Court said neither the EC nor the state government would go beyond the orders passed by it in the matter.

The February 20 order - an "extraordinary" direction - to deploy serving and former district judges to assist the EC in the SIR exercise came amid a bitter fight between the Bengal government and the poll body.

On February 24, the Supreme Court allowed the deployment of West Bengal civil judges, in addition to 250 district judges, and the requisitioning of judicial officers from Jharkhand and Odisha to handle 80 lakh claims and objections.