‘Trust deficit’: Supreme Court orders deployment of district judges for Bengal SIR

“There seems to be a serious dispute between the parties with respect to the substantive/ actual rank and status of the officers who have been provided by the state government for the performance of the duties as EROs and Assistant EROs. It is, however, nearly impossible for this court to determine the prescribed rank and status of the officers now deployed with the ECI by the state government,” it said.

“Be that as it may, in order to ensure fairness in the adjudication of the genuineness of the documents relied upon and the consequential determination for inclusion or exclusion in the voter list, and as agreed to by both sides, we are left with hardly any other option but to request the Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court to spare some serving judicial officers along with some former judicial officers of impeccable integrity in the rank of Additional District Judge or District Judge, who can then, in each district, be requested to revisit and dispose of the claims under the category of ‘logical discrepancy/unmapped category’,” it said.

Given that the the modalities will have to be evolved at the High Court level, the SC also directed “the Chief Electoral Officer along with one authorised senior officer of the ECI, Chief Secretary, Director General of Police of the State Government, and in the presence of Advocate General of the State and learned Additional Solicitor General in Calcutta High Court, to hold a meeting with the Chief Justice tomorrow itself i.e., 21.02.2026.”

“Each such judicial officer/ former judicial officer shall be assisted by the micro observers from the ECI side and by officers of the state government who have already been deputed by the state to perform or assist in such duties,” it said, underlining that “the circumstances being extraordinary, request for entrustment of the responsibility to the judicial officers/ former judicial officers is also of extraordinary nature.”

Saying that such deployment of judicial officers may have some impact on pending court cases, the bench advised “some interim arrangement for shifting of matters for interim relief or of urgent nature to alternate courts”.

The “Collector/SP shall be obligated and is hereby directed to directly render assistance and provide all kinds of logistic support to the presiding judicial officers and their team for the purpose of smooth completion of the pending process”, the bench said.

The bench also allowed the ECI to publish the list “to the extent it gets completed” by February 28, adding “that will not be taken as a final publication” and “subsequently, the supplementary list can be added”.

Stating that completion of the SIR exercise is the “foremost urgent issue that has risen for our consideration”, it noted that “the stage where the process is now stuck relates to adjudication of claims and objections of the persons who have been included in ‘logical discrepancy/unmapped category’.”

Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the state government, said the court had extended the date for uploading the claims and objections from February 14 to 21, but the ECI stopped it on February 15. “Now 1.5 lakh cannot be uploaded, and 3.5 lakh have been given no notice. What will happen to that,” he said.

The bench said the judicial officers can decide that too. “All other ancillary issues placed before us or that may arise during the process shall also be decided by the presiding officers to be nominated by the Chief Justice,” it said.

The CJI asked the state to “cooperate with the HC… provide logistic support and assistance” and to “create that environment so that they (judicial officers) can discharge their responsibilities.”

A counsel said the state police was not acting in cases of violence highlighted in a petition filed before the court. The bench then directed the Director General of Police to file a supplementary affidavit giving details of the complaints received so far and action taken.

Taking up the matter, the bench sought to know whether its orders of February 9 had been complied with.

“Since the court gave us the liberty to replace officers, we have written to them (state government)… look this is the requirement, we need officers of this nature…and they have said in a reply a couple of days ago (February 17)…that the government is examining the list of eligible officers,” Senior Advocate D S Naidu, appearing for the ECI, said. “Everything depends at this stage on adjudication of documents and their validity. And this is to be done by EROs. We are short of qualified EROs,” he said.

“In spite of our order on February 9, on February 17 you are saying you are still examining,” the CJI said, adding “we are disappointed” by the state’s response.

Sibal said the state had already provided Group B officers, but Naidu said they “are not qualified” as the EROs/AEROs have to perform quasi-judicial functions.

Senior Advocate Menaka Guruswamy, also appearing for the state, said that “in Bengal, we only have 69 SDOs.”

“In that case, the state should have told the ECI, we don’t have enough officers, you bring from wherever you can,” the CJI said.