Booth-level party agents not liable for all SIR form details: Delhi High Court

The September 3 order said, “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. Therefore, in the opinion of this Court, the BLA can only be made liable in terms of Section 31 of the RP Act for information that can be verified by the BLA, i.e. that the photograph on the Enumeration Form matches with the identity of the elector whose Form it is.” 

The bench added 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. The said information would be exclusively within the knowledge of the concerned elector. 

Justice Amit Bansal said that 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.

Who verifies what?

The case concerns the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Delhi. The petitioners are Devender Yadav, President of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee, and the chairman of its Booth Management Committee. The Election Commission of India (ECI) issued SIR guidelines on June 24, 2025, and subsequently, through a circular dated May 14, decided to conduct the exercise in Delhi.

The Congress representatives objected to a requirement that Booth Level Agents (BLAs) give a personal undertaking that they had verified the correctness of details in enumeration forms submitted to Booth Level Officers (BLOs). They also sought copies of the 2002 electoral rolls and the Frozen Colour Photo Electoral Roll for facilitating the participation of BLAs in the SIR process. 

The petitioners had earlier approached the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court on the issue before filing the present petition. The Supreme Court allowed them to approach the Delhi High Court.

Senior Advocate Sakal Bhushan and advocates Sunil Kumar, Vasu Bhushan, Prateek Kumar Sinha and Nipun Bhushan, appearing for the petitioners, argued that 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 counsel submitted that since the responsibility for verification has been placed on the BLO, the BLA, who is a representative of a political party, cannot personally verify details provided by the elector.

They argued that 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. 

ECI’s checks and balances

Dama Sheshadri Naidu, senior counsel appearing on behalf of ECI, submitted that the task performed by BLA of a political party was voluntary. A political party was not under an obligation to appoint a BLA. Once a BLA had been appointed by a political party and some responsibilities had been assigned to the said BLA, it had to be performed with a degree of responsibility. Hence, the prescribed undertaking was like checks and balances imposed by the ECI on the BLA. 

The court clearly stated that BLAs do not participate in the statutory verification or in any other statutory process related to inclusion or exclusion in electoral rolls. The court held that BLAs could not be required to give a personal undertaking certifying the correctness of all particulars in the enumeration forms. On the electoral rolls, the ECI said the 2002 and 2025 rolls were available on its website and could be downloaded.