Senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram said on Tuesday that Chief Justice of India Surya Kant had made it clear that the Supreme Court had not approved any modification to Form 6, the document used to add names to electoral rolls. The remarks came as members of the INDIA bloc, carrying tricolours and banners reading “Save Democracy,” marched from Parliament to the Election Commission of India headquarters, demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
The protest follows a day after CJI Surya Kant clarified in an open court that the Supreme Court had not sanctioned a revised version of Form 6 for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise. The clarification was delivered while hearing a petition that sought the prosecution of CEC Kumar.
Chidambaram criticised the SIR exercise, calling it unconstitutional and ultra‑vires, and argued that the changes to Form 6 effectively excluded voters. He questioned the relevance of questions about whether a voter’s parents had been voters, stating that the right to vote depends only on citizenship, age and residence.
He also raised concerns about the alleged misuse of Form 7, the form used to delete names from electoral rolls. Citing an incident in Karnataka where BJP workers filed 7,000 applications to remove voters, he said the process had been abused for mass deletions. Chidambaram urged the resignation of the CEC, noting that former and sitting judges had issued notices and that the matter was not merely political but a concern for the public.
