Published by the Human Rights Advocacy and Research Foundation (HRF), The Elusive Search for Justice: 30 Year Review of the SCs & STs (PoA) Act brings together the work of former civil servants, lawyers, academics, human rights defenders and Dalit rights activists to assess how India’s principal anti-atrocities legislation has functioned over three decades. Across its chapters, the report paints a troubling picture of rising atrocities, persistently low conviction rates, and poor implementation of victim compensation schemes, weak monitoring mechanisms, and widespread institutional failures that continue to undermine access to justice. The report’s central conclusion is that while Parliament has repeatedly strengthened the law through amendments and expanded protections for victims, the institutions responsible for implementing these safeguards have largely failed to match the law’s ambition.

Among the most revealing contributions to the volume is a chapter by activist, writer and human rights defender Vidya Bhushan Rawat, who examines the functioning of the Act in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Haryana. While the broader report identifies national trends of weak implementation and institutional apathy, Rawat’s chapter shows how these failures manifest on the ground, in police stations, district administrations, courts and villages across northern India.

Unlike chapters that focus on legislative history or national statistics, Rawat’s contribution is rooted in lived experiences. Drawing on field investigations, case studies, Right to Information disclosures and years of engagement with Dalit communities, he examines the obstacles faced by survivors seeking justice under the PoA Act. Rawat’s account suggests that the greatest barriers often emerge not in the courtroom but much earlier, at the stages of complaint registration, investigation and administrative response.

Rawat’s central argument is that the crisis confronting the PoA Act is no longer one of legislative inadequacy. Over three decades, Parliament has progressively strengthened the law, expanded the list of recognised offences, enhanced victim protections and introduced new accountability mechanisms. Yet the effectiveness of these provisions ultimately depends upon the willingness of police officers, prosecutors, district administrations and local governments to enforce them. It is at this level, he argues, that the law repeatedly breaks down.

The result is a system in which the formal existence of legal rights often bears little resemblance to the realities experienced by Dalit survivors attempting to access protection, accountability and justice.

The hidden crisis behind atrocity statistics

Rawat begins by challenging a common assumption that official crime statistics adequately capture the scale of caste violence.

For many observers, NCRB data provides the principal measure of atrocities committed against Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Rawat argues that these figures reveal only a fraction of the reality. The larger problem, he suggests, lies in the vast number of incidents that never enter official records at all.

Across Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring states, Dalit complainants frequently encounter resistance at the very first stage of the criminal justice process. Police officials may refuse to register FIRs under the PoA Act, dilute charges, classify incidents as ordinary criminal disputes, or encourage parties to arrive at informal compromises. In many villages, survivors must navigate local power structures before they can even reach a police station.

The consequence is that official statistics may reflect only those cases that successfully overcome multiple layers of institutional resistance.

Rawat argues that any assessment of the PoA Act that relies exclusively on registered cases risks overlooking the structural barriers that prevent countless incidents from being formally recognised as atrocities in the first place.

Uttar Pradesh: The limits of legal protection

Among the three states examined, Uttar Pradesh occupies a central place in Rawat’s analysis. The state has long recorded some of the highest numbers of crimes against Scheduled Castes in the country. Yet Rawat contends that these figures tell only part of the story. The deeper problem lies in the persistent inability of victims to secure meaningful justice after a case is reported.

According to the chapter, many police officials continue to approach caste atrocities through the lens of local disputes rather than recognising them as manifestations of entrenched social discrimination. Complaints are often discouraged, investigations delayed, and statutory provisions under the PoA Act either ignored or improperly applied.

Rawat argues that this administrative response reflects a broader reluctance within state institutions to confront caste power directly. Rather than functioning as neutral enforcers of the law, institutions frequently mirror the social hierarchies that the legislation was intended to challenge.

The Case of Shivam: A child, a crushed arm, and a system that failed

To illustrate these dynamics, Rawat recounts the case of Shivam, an eight-year-old Dalit child from Jaunpur district whose arm was allegedly crushed in a sugarcane-crushing machine owned by an upper-caste family in December 2015.

The incident should have triggered an immediate legal response. Instead, according to the account presented in the chapter, the family encountered resistance from law-enforcement authorities when they sought to pursue the matter. Efforts to register a complaint were allegedly met with indifference, while those assisting the family reportedly faced hostility from officials.

What makes the case particularly significant for Rawat is not merely the injury itself but the social environment surrounding it.

The family belonged to a community economically dependent upon dominant-caste landowners. Villagers were reportedly unwilling to speak openly about the incident, fearing repercussions. The imbalance of power was such that even seeking justice carried social and economic risks. Ultimately, concerns for safety and survival reportedly forced the family to leave the village.

For Rawat, the episode demonstrates how caste violence cannot be understood solely as a criminal act. It is sustained by relationships of economic dependence, social exclusion and institutional indifference that make accountability exceptionally difficult to achieve.

Hundreds of cases, no convictions

Perhaps the most striking evidence presented in the chapter comes from information obtained through Right to Information applications in eastern Uttar Pradesh. Seeking to understand how the PoA Act functioned in practice, activists requested data from police authorities in Deoria and Kushinagar districts regarding cases registered under the Act between 2015 and 2019.

The responses revealed a startling pattern. In Deoria district, 568 cases had reportedly been registered under the Act across seventeen police stations during the five-year period. Yet not a single conviction had been secured. In neighbouring Kushinagar district, 754 cases had reportedly been registered across thirteen police stations during the same period. Again, there was not a single conviction. For Rawat, these figures are among the most compelling indicators of institutional failure.

The issue is not merely that convictions are low. Rather, the complete absence of convictions despite hundreds of registered cases raises fundamental questions about investigations, prosecutions, witness protection and judicial outcomes. Such figures suggest a justice system in which the formal registration of cases does not necessarily translate into accountability.

The chapter argues that marginalised communities such as Mushahars and Doms—among the most socio-economically vulnerable groups in the region—face particular obstacles in sustaining legal battles against socially and politically influential perpetrators.

Haryana and the Bhagana struggle

The chapter also revisits the Bhagana movement in Haryana, one of the most prominent Dalit rights struggles in recent years. The Bhagana episode became emblematic of the vulnerabilities faced by Dalit communities confronting dominant-caste power structures. Rawat argues that despite national attention and public mobilisation, many affected families continued to face displacement, insecurity and uncertainty long after the initial incidents.

The chapter questions whether state institutions have meaningfully addressed the grievances of survivors or ensured accountability for those responsible. Years after the events, the promise of rehabilitation and justice remained largely unrealised.

For Rawat, Bhagana exemplifies a recurring pattern visible across many atrocity cases: public outrage may generate temporary visibility, but institutional follow-through remains weak.

Uttarakhand: When administrative structures complicate justice

Rawat’s discussion of Uttarakhand focuses particularly on the Jaunsar region, where he raises concerns about the interaction between social realities and administrative classifications.

According to the chapter, the widespread Scheduled Tribe classification in the region has created complex challenges for the implementation of the PoA Act. Rawat argues that social hierarchies and discriminatory practices continue to exist despite official classifications that often obscure these realities. The chapter points to continuing experiences of exclusion faced by communities such as the Kolta and Bajagi. Practices associated with untouchability, restrictions on social participation and entrenched caste hierarchies, Rawat argues, remain part of everyday life in many areas.

Rawat’s broader concern is that administrative categories sometimes fail to reflect the actual distribution of social power on the ground. When legal frameworks are built upon such classifications, opportunities for accountability may be weakened. The Jaunsar example thus serves as a reminder that the effectiveness of anti-discrimination laws depends not only on legal provisions but also on the accuracy with which institutions understand social realities.

The Larger Lesson: The problem is enforcement

Running through the chapter is a consistent theme. The PoA Act has not failed because Parliament neglected to create legal protections. Successive governments have expanded the law, strengthened penalties, increased compensation, established monitoring mechanisms and introduced procedural safeguards.

Yet none of these measures can succeed when the institutions responsible for implementation remain unwilling or unable to act. Across Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Haryana, Rawat identifies recurring patterns: reluctance to register cases, weak investigations, pressure on victims to compromise, social and economic intimidation of witnesses, delays in prosecution and negligible accountability for officials who fail to perform their duties.

The cumulative effect is the creation of a justice system that often places the burden of enforcement upon the very communities it was designed to protect.

Thirty years after the enactment of the PoA Act, Rawat’s assessment is sobering. The greatest challenge facing India’s anti-atrocities framework is no longer the absence of legal safeguards. It is the persistence of caste power within the institutions responsible for enforcing them.

As long as that reality remains unchanged, the chapter suggests, the promise of justice embodied in the PoA Act will continue to remain beyond the reach of many Dalit survivors.

The complete chapter may be read below:

The complete report may be read below:

Detailed story on the complete report may be accessed here.

Related:

UP: 14-Year-Old Dalit Content Creator Ashwamit Gautam faces arrest, FIR over strong dissenting social media videos

‘We Were Promised Rehabilitation’: Gurugram’s oldest Dalit settlement bulldozed after decade long battle; police violently beat and detain residents for protesting

CJP flags casteist, anti-Dalit videos on YouTube targeting CJI Gavai; seeks urgent takedown

Unending Violence: Caste atrocities haunt Uttar Pradesh’s Dalit communities

Custodial Death of Dalit Law Student Somnath Suryawanshi: FIR registered after Supreme Court upholds Bombay HC directive

Dalit Justice Demanded: CJP exposes 30 brutal anti-Dalits atrocities, urges NCSC to confront nationwide caste violence under Article 338

The post Thirty years on, justice remains elusive for Dalits in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Haryana appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Court answered that question in the affirmative.

In doing so, it has delivered what may prove to be one of the most consequential judgments on internet governance and platform regulation in India. While the judgment is framed as a narrow, emergency response to an exceptional situation, the legal principles it endorses have implications that extend to every major digital platform operating in India. The decision substantially expands the scope of Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, broadens the meaning of “public order” in the digital context, and adopts an unusually deferential approach to governmental claims of necessity and proportionality.

The immediate dispute may have ended with NEET. The constitutional questions raised by the judgment have only just begun.

A case that was never really about Telegram

The government’s justification for the blocking order rested on a familiar narrative. Following the cancellation of the original NEET examination amid allegations of paper leaks and widespread irregularities, authorities claimed that Telegram had become a central vehicle for the circulation of fraudulent examination material, fake leak claims, scams targeting candidates, and organised cheating networks.

The government relied upon reports from the National Testing Agency (NTA), the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), and various law-enforcement agencies to argue that Telegram’s infrastructure had become deeply embedded in these activities. The Court accepted these claims, noting allegations that channels openly advertising themselves as “PAPER LEAKED NEET” and similar variants were operating on the platform and soliciting large sums of money from students. The Court also accepted evidence suggesting that mirror channels, reserve groups, bots, and audience migration systems allowed operators to evade enforcement efforts and quickly reconstitute themselves after takedowns.

Yet the real issue before the Court was not whether examination fraud existed. Few would dispute that it did. The real issue was whether the existence of unlawful activity on a platform can justify disabling access to the platform itself.

That distinction is critical. The Indian legal system has long recognised that newspapers may publish unlawful content without justifying a ban on newspapers as a medium. Telephone networks may be used for criminal conspiracies without justifying the suspension of telecommunication services. Email services may facilitate fraud without warranting the shutdown of email itself.

The question before the Court was therefore not whether Telegram had been misused, but whether misuse by some users justified restricting access for everyone. The judgment ultimately answers that question in favour of the State.

A detailed report on the Telegram ban may be read here.

Transforming Section 69A into a platform-blocking power

The single most important aspect of the decision is the Court’s interpretation of Section 69A of the Information Technology Act. Historically, Section 69A has been understood as a mechanism through which the government can block access to specific information hosted online. The provision authorises blocking “any information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in any computer resource.”

Telegram argued that this language permits blocking particular content but not an entire platform. The Court rejected this argument.

Relying upon the expansive definition of “information” under Section 2(1)(v) of the IT Act—which includes software, computer programmes, codes and databases—the Court held that there was “no reason to exclude an application or platform” from the scope of Section 69A. Since Telegram itself is software comprising code, databases, and communication infrastructure, the Court concluded that the entire platform constitutes “information” capable of being blocked.

“The expression “information”, appearing in Section 69A of the IT Act, is defined under Section 2(1)(v) of the IT Act and includes, inter alia, images, sound, voice, codes, computer programmes, software and databases. The breadth of the said definition indicates that the expression “information” is required to be construed expansively. A restrictive construction, confining the expression only to individual user accounts, channels, images, posts, files or messages, would unduly narrow the scope of Section 69A and may render the provision otiose. The legislative intent, therefore, appears to be to confer a broad and technologically neutral meaning upon the expression “information”.” (Para 35)

This is a dramatic interpretive leap. Section 69A was enacted in a vastly different technological context. For years, it has been used primarily to block URLs, websites, accounts, posts, pages, and other identifiable pieces of online content. The Delhi High Court’s reasoning effectively transforms it into a statutory basis for disabling entire digital ecosystems.

The distinction is not merely semantic as blocking a webpage and blocking a platform are fundamentally different exercises of state power. One targets particular content. The other disables an entire infrastructure of communication.

The judgment therefore does not simply uphold the Telegram ban. It significantly enlarges the legal architecture of internet censorship in India. If the reasoning is followed in future cases, the government may argue that any platform itself constitutes “information” and may therefore be blocked whenever authorities conclude that statutory grounds under Section 69A are satisfied. The implications extend far beyond Telegram.

The extraordinary expansion of “Public Order”

Equally striking is the Court’s treatment of public order. Section 69A permits blocking only on limited grounds, including sovereignty and integrity of India, security of the State, and public order. Historically, Indian constitutional jurisprudence has treated “public order” as a serious and relatively narrow category. The Supreme Court has repeatedly distinguished public order from ordinary law-and-order concerns and emphasised that restrictions on fundamental freedoms require a proximate and not merely speculative connection with public disorder.

In the present case, however, the Court appears willing to accept a significantly broader conception of public order. The judgment repeatedly refers to the possibility that misinformation regarding examination papers could erode public confidence in the examination process, trigger unrest among candidates, undermine faith in public institutions, and potentially lead to public disorder.

This reasoning raises important concerns. The Court does not identify any actual breakdown of public order directly caused by Telegram’s continued operation between the issuance of the blocking order and the examination. Instead, it relies primarily upon anticipated consequences and the possibility of future disruption.

“In the present case, the Impugned Order discloses that temporary blocking of the public access to Telegram is directed having regard to the potential grave implications for public order in the country and for preventing the commission of cognizable offences arising from the circulation of examination-related misinformation and purported examination papers on Telegram, particularly in light of prior incidents relating to NEET UG, 2026.” (Para 24)

“Thus, this Court is of the view that given the emergency nature of the Impugned Order, the reasons supplied in arriving at the decision were sufficient. As Respondent No. 1 has strictly followed the procedural steps as required under Section 69A of the IT Act, the challenge to the Impugned Order on the ground non-communication of reasons cannot be sustained. Accordingly, the objections founded on alleged non-application of mind and inadequacy of opportunity of hearing also fail given the statutory scheme of Section 69A of the IT Act and 2009 Rules. In view of the foregoing, this Court is of the considered opinion that the Impugned Order contains reasons and there exists a direct and substantial nexus between the direction issued and the reasons assigned.” (Para 25)

The result is a conception of public order that appears considerably broader than traditional constitutional doctrine. Under this framework, the State may be able to justify restrictions not because disorder exists, but because misinformation could theoretically undermine public confidence in an institution and thereby create conditions for disorder.

That shift is significant. If accepted as a general principle, the same logic could potentially be invoked in relation to elections, recruitment examinations, public protests, political controversies, or other events where misinformation is alleged to threaten institutional legitimacy. The danger lies not in the immediate facts of the case, but in the elasticity of the principle being created.

The curious treatment of proportionality

The Court repeatedly invokes the doctrine of proportionality and cites the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in Anuradha Bhasin. It correctly notes that restrictions upon fundamental rights must be necessary, proportionate, and constitute the least restrictive means available for achieving a legitimate objective.

However, the judgment’s application of that doctrine is considerably less rigorous than its recitation. The government’s central claim was that narrower measures had failed. According to authorities, Telegram’s architecture enabled the rapid reappearance of unlawful actors through mirror channels, reserve groups, bots, and alternate identities. Consequently, channel-specific takedowns were said to be ineffective.

The Court largely accepted this assertion. What is missing, however, is a meaningful examination of alternative measures.

“In the present case, the NEET UG, 2026 examination is scheduled to be conducted on 21.06.2026. The temporary blocking of Telegram under the Orders is operative only until 22.06.2026, while the disabling of the message-editing feature is confined to the period until 30.06.2026. The limited temporal scope of these measures demonstrates that they are narrowly tailored and confined to the period strictly necessary for securing the stated objective. Applying the parameters laid down in Anuradha Bhasin (supra), this Court is satisfied that the requirements of proportionality stand fulfilled, namely: (i) identification of a legitimate objective; (ii) existence of a rational nexus between the objective and the measure adopted; (iii) necessity of the measure in the facts and circumstances of the case; and (iv) adoption of the least restrictive measure available.” (Para 46)

A genuine proportionality analysis would ordinarily require the State to demonstrate why each less restrictive option was inadequate. The judgment does not meaningfully interrogate several possibilities:

• enhanced emergency compliance obligations;
• platform-specific moderation requirements;
• targeted blocking of identified channels;
• restrictions on public channels exceeding certain thresholds;
• disabling forwarding features;
• temporary limitations on bot functionality;
• emergency monitoring arrangements;
• targeted orders directed at specific classes of accounts.

Instead, the Court appears to accept the government’s conclusion that these alternatives would not work. The distinction is important because proportionality requires courts to independently verify governmental claims of necessity. It does not require courts merely to accept them. By deferring substantially to executive assessments regarding platform architecture and technical feasibility, the Court risks diluting the very standard of scrutiny that proportionality was designed to impose.

The forgotten rights of 150 million users

Perhaps the most striking omission in the judgment is the relative absence of any serious engagement with the rights of Telegram’s lawful users. The Court expressly acknowledges that approximately 150 million people in India use Telegram. Yet these users remain largely invisible throughout the constitutional analysis.

The judgment contains extensive discussion of examination integrity, public confidence, platform architecture, bots, channels, and enforcement difficulties. Comparatively little attention is devoted to the rights being restricted.

There is almost no sustained analysis of:

• the speech rights of ordinary users;
• educational communities operating on Telegram;
• journalists and researchers using the platform;
• businesses conducting communications through Telegram;
• civil-society organisations dependent upon Telegram networks;
• the broader Article 19(1)(a) implications of disabling an entire communications platform.

This imbalance matters because proportionality requires balancing. The Court carefully assesses the interests of 2.2 million NEET candidates but devotes far less attention to the constitutional rights of 150 million users whose access to a communications platform was suspended. The asymmetry is difficult to ignore.

Architecture as a basis for restriction

Another deeply consequential feature of the judgment is its repeated emphasis on Telegram’s architecture. The Court identifies Telegram’s defining characteristics as reasons why platform-wide intervention was necessary:

• large public channels;
• cloud-based storage;
• automated bots;
• anonymity through usernames;
• reserve-channel structures;
• rapid audience migration systems;
• message-editing functionality.

What is striking is that the Court explicitly acknowledges that these features are not unlawful. Yet it nonetheless treats them as factors justifying extraordinary state intervention because they allegedly make enforcement more difficult. This aspect of the judgment may have implications extending far beyond examination fraud.

“The Orders expressly record that entity-specific interventions, including the reporting and removal of channels, groups, bots, and accounts, were repeatedly found to be ineffective and inadequate. Further, the audience-migration mechanisms enable operators to rapidly reconstitute networks after enforcement action was taken by the concerned authorities. It is clearly observed in the Orders that despite corrective measures having been sought in relation to various misuses of the Telegram platform, fresh material, including reports received from Respondent Nos. 2 and 3, disclosed the continued occurrence of illicit activities by unlawful entities notwithstanding prior interventions. Therefore, it is evident that narrower measures, including the takedown of specific bots and channels, were ineffective having regard to the particular nature and architecture of the Telegram platform.” (Para 45)

Many privacy-protective technologies are deliberately designed to minimise surveillance, decentralise control, or resist centralised moderation. If technological architecture itself becomes a ground for restrictive action whenever authorities believe it impedes enforcement, a wide range of digital platforms could face heightened regulatory vulnerability. The judgment therefore moves the debate beyond content moderation and into the realm of platform design. That shift is profound.

Preventive regulation and the message-editing feature

The Court also upheld the government’s separate direction disabling Telegram’s message-editing functionality. The rationale was that users could allegedly modify messages after an examination and falsely create the impression that papers had been leaked beforehand. Telegram’s own acknowledgement that it was making edited labels more visible was treated as corroborative evidence supporting this concern.

Here too the Court adopts a highly preventive approach. Rather than responding to demonstrated misuse, the restriction is justified largely by the possibility of future misuse. The judgment therefore reflects an increasing willingness to permit governmental intervention into platform design choices based upon anticipated harms rather than completed violations. Whether such preventive regulation can be reconciled with robust free-speech protections remains an open question.

A judgment likely to impact India’s digital future

The Delhi High Court presents its decision as a narrow, temporary and exceptional response to an extraordinary crisis surrounding NEET-UG 2026. Yet some of the most significant constitutional judgments emerge from exceptional circumstances. The lasting importance of this case lies not in the temporary suspension of Telegram but in the principles the Court has endorsed:

• that Section 69A authorises blocking entire platforms and not merely content;
• that platform architecture may itself justify platform-wide restrictions;
• that examination-related misinformation can be treated as a public-order threat warranting emergency intervention;
• that post-decisional hearings can sufficiently cure concerns regarding emergency censorship;
• and that the rights of millions of lawful users may be overridden where the State demonstrates a sufficiently compelling regulatory objective.

Taken together, these propositions represent a substantial expansion of executive power over digital communications. The judgment undoubtedly reflects legitimate concerns about examination fraud, organised criminal networks, and the integrity of public institutions. But constitutional law is tested not when governments pursue illegitimate goals, but when they pursue legitimate ones through extraordinary means.

The real question raised by the Telegram judgment is therefore not whether the State should combat examination fraud. It unquestionably should. The deeper question is whether the misuse of a communications platform by some users can justify denying access to all users.

By answering that question in the affirmative, the Delhi High Court has moved Indian internet jurisprudence decisively toward a model of platform-level regulation and censorship. Whether higher courts ultimately endorse that approach may determine the future contours of digital freedom in India.

The complete judgment may be read below:

Related:

Censorship After NEET: A substitute for accountability

When Morality Meets Surveillance: The court’s push toward state-regulated digital content

Repeal recent amendments to the RTI act, 2005: Justice A.P Shah in an Open Letter

Safe harbour or shadow censorship? The battle over India’s digital speech

State-sponsored attacks of surveillance reveal an erosion on Indians’ right to privacy, especially journalists, political opposition

The post The telegram NEET case and the expansion of platform-level censorship in India appeared first on SabrangIndia.

In a detailed representation submitted to the authorities, the organisation has argued that the residents of Kandapara Longjap Taungya, Padumoni Taungya, Hatijur Taungya and 9 No. Kheroni Taungya cannot legally be treated as ordinary encroachers on forestland. According to the representation, these villages were established under the Taungya system—a forest management arrangement created and administered by the Forest Department itself—which settled families within forest areas in return for their labour in forestry operations. The organisation has further contended that any attempt to evict these residents without first recognising and verifying their rights under the Forest Rights Act would violate both the statutory protections contained in the legislation and repeated directions issued by the Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs.

At one level, the dispute concerns four villages facing the threat of displacement. At another, it raises far-reaching questions about the implementation of one of India’s most significant social justice legislations. The controversy unfolding in the Lutumari Longjap Reserve Forest goes to the heart of a long-standing tension in India’s forest governance framework: how should the law treat communities that were settled in forests through state policy, contributed labour to the development of forest landscapes for generations, and yet never received formal recognition of their rights over the land they occupied?

The issue is particularly significant because the Forest Rights Act, 2006 (The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006) was enacted precisely to address what Parliament described as the “historical injustice” suffered by forest-dwelling communities whose customary and occupation-based rights were either ignored or never formally recorded. Far from excluding Taungya settlements from its protection, the legislation expressly recognises them as a distinct category of forest villages and provides mechanisms for the recognition of their rights and, ultimately, the conversion of such settlements into revenue villages. Yet nearly two decades after the enactment of the law, residents of many forest villages in Assam continue to exist in a state of legal uncertainty, vulnerable to eviction despite the protections ostensibly guaranteed by Parliament.

The present controversy therefore extends beyond the immediate fate of the affected villages. It raises fundamental questions about whether communities specifically recognised under the Forest Rights Act can be subjected to eviction before the statutory process for recognition of rights has been completed. It also exposes a deeper contradiction within forest administration itself. The families presently facing eviction are not alleged to have recently occupied reserve forest land. Rather, they belong to settlements whose origins lie in a state-sponsored forestry system that depended upon their labour and permitted their occupation for decades. The attempt to now classify these communities as illegal occupants invites scrutiny not only of the legality of the eviction notices themselves, but also of the larger failure to resolve the historical status of forest villages in Assam.

To understand why the AIUFWP has described the proposed evictions as unlawful, it is necessary to revisit both the history of the Taungya system and the legal protections that Parliament sought to create through the Forest Rights Act.

A forest department that created settlements now calls their residents encroachers

For more than a century, the people living in Kandapara Longjap Taungya, Padumoni Taungya, Hatijur Taungya and 9 No. Kheroni Taungya in Assam’s Nagaon Forest Division have occupied a peculiar position in India’s forest governance framework. Their villages were not spontaneous encroachments. They were settlements created and sustained under the colonial and post-colonial Taungya system, a system designed by the Forest Department itself to secure a stable labour force for forestry operations. Yet today, these very communities are being served eviction notices and labelled “encroachers.”

The contradiction is stark. A state institution that historically settled families inside forests for the purpose of forest management is now seeking to remove their descendants by treating them as unlawful occupants. The legal problem is even more serious. The proposed evictions appear to be directly contrary to the provisions of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (FRA), a legislation enacted precisely to remedy such historical injustices.

The controversy unfolding in the Lutumari Longjap Reserve Forest is therefore not merely a dispute over land. It is a test of whether the Forest Rights Act will be implemented in Assam in the manner Parliament intended, or whether communities specifically recognised by the Act will continue to face displacement despite statutory protection.

The forgotten history of the Taungya system

Understanding why these evictions are problematic requires understanding who the Taungya residents are.

The Taungya system was introduced by the British colonial administration as a method of forest management. Landless peasants and shifting cultivators were settled in forest areas and permitted to cultivate land while simultaneously providing labour for forestry operations, timber extraction and plantation work. The arrangement supplied the colonial Forest Department with a dependable workforce while reducing the costs of forest management.

In Assam, Taungya settlements were established throughout the colonial period. Historical studies show that these settlements functioned primarily as labour colonies for the Forest Department. Residents were expected to perform forestry work in exchange for limited cultivation rights and habitation. Over time, however, these temporary settlements evolved into permanent villages as generations of families continued to reside there.

Professor Chandan Kumar Sharma and Indrani Sarma, in their study on forest villages and forest dwellers in Assam, explain that forest villages and Taungya settlements were integral to colonial forest governance. They were not illegal occupations of forest land but settlements consciously established by state authorities to support forestry operations.

The history of the Lutumari Longjap settlements is consistent with this broader pattern. Indeed, official records produced by the Assam Government itself demonstrate that families were deliberately settled under the Taungya system in the Kaki and Lutumari Reserved Forest areas. A June 7, 1974 communication from the Assam Forest Department directed authorities to provide temporary shelter to hundreds of evicted families under the Taungya system in Kaki Reserved Forest and Lutumari Longjap Reserved Forest after proper screening by designated committees.

This document is critically important. It shows that occupation of these areas was not clandestine or unlawful. The state itself facilitated settlement under an official policy framework.

The present attempt to classify residents of these villages as encroachers therefore raises an obvious question: how can people settled by the Forest Department under a recognised Taungya scheme subsequently be treated as illegal occupants?

The Forest Rights Act, 2006 explicitly recognises Taungya Villages

The Forest Rights Act leaves little ambiguity on this issue. One of the most significant features of the FRA is that it expressly recognises forest villages and Taungya settlements. Section 2(f) defines “forest village” to include settlements established by Forest Departments for forestry operations and specifically includes “all types of Taungya settlements.”

This inclusion was not accidental. Parliament enacted the FRA to address what the statute itself describes as the “historical injustice” suffered by forest-dwelling communities whose customary rights were never recognised during colonial rule and continued to remain unrecorded after independence. The Act acknowledges that state forest policies systematically excluded forest dwellers from legal recognition despite their long-standing relationship with forests.

Taungya communities were among the clearest examples of this injustice. For decades they supplied labour to the Forest Department, helped create and maintain forest landscapes, and lived under state supervision without ever receiving secure tenure over the lands they occupied. The FRA was designed to correct precisely this situation.

Consequently, the law not only recognises Taungya settlements but also creates a pathway for their legal transformation. Section 3(1)(h) specifically recognises rights relating to the “conversion of all forest villages, old habitations, unsurveyed villages and other villages in forests” into revenue villages.

The legislative intent is therefore unmistakable: forest villages and Taungya settlements are to be regularised and recognised, not erased through eviction.

AIUFWP’s case against the evictions

According to the representation submitted by the AIUFWP, the affected families possess a range of documentary evidence demonstrating their long association with the settlements, including Taungya allotment records, annual khiraji pattas, electoral documents and other official records. The organisation argues that these documents, read alongside the historical record of state-sponsored settlement under the Taungya system, fundamentally undermine attempts to characterise the residents as illegal occupants of forest land.

The organisation has also drawn attention to a June 7, 1974 communication issued by the Assam Forest Department relating to settlement under the Taungya system in Kaki Reserved Forest and Lutumari Longjap Reserved Forest. According to the AIUFWP, the document demonstrates that the state itself facilitated the settlement of families in these areas and therefore cannot now ignore the historical basis of their occupation while pursuing eviction proceedings.

Most importantly, the representation argues that the Forest Rights Act creates a statutory bar against eviction until the process of recognition and verification of rights has been completed. Since the affected villages fall within a category of settlements expressly recognised under the legislation, the organisation contends that any eviction undertaken without completing this process would be unlawful.

The complete document may be read here.

The Most Serious Legal Problem: Section 4(5) absolutely prohibits eviction before rights recognition

Even if there were disputes regarding individual claims, the FRA contains a clear statutory safeguard. Section 4(5) states: “No member of a forest dwelling Scheduled Tribe or other traditional forest dweller shall be evicted or removed from forest land under his occupation till the recognition and verification procedure is complete.”

This provision is central to the architecture of the FRA. It recognises that forest dwellers historically faced displacement before their claims could be heard. Parliament therefore prohibited eviction until the entire process of recognition, verification and adjudication of rights had been completed.

The legal consequence is straightforward. Before any eviction can lawfully occur:

• Forest Rights Committees must be constituted.
• Claims must be invited.
• Claims must be verified.
• Appeals must be exhausted.
• Rights must be finally determined.

Only after completion of this statutory process can questions of removal arise. According to the representations made regarding the four Taungya villages, no meaningful FRA implementation process has been initiated and no recognition exercise has been completed. If this is correct, eviction notices issued at this stage would be fundamentally inconsistent with Section 4(5).

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MOTA) has repeatedly clarified that no evictions are permissible

The legal position becomes even clearer when one examines official directions issued by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, the nodal ministry responsible for implementation of the FRA. In April 2015, the Ministry expressly directed State Level Monitoring Committees to ensure that Section 4(5) is implemented “in letter and spirit” and that no forest dweller is evicted or removed until the FRA process is complete.

The Ministry also repeatedly expressed concern regarding wrongful rejection of claims, lack of communication of rejection orders, failures in appeals processes and improper implementation by state authorities. It instructed states to review doubtful rejections and ensure that rightful claimants are not denied protection.

Subsequent communications reiterated that implementation cannot be rushed, procedural safeguards cannot be bypassed, and recognition of rights is incomplete until appeals are exhausted and records of rights are created.

These directions are highly relevant in Assam because the state has historically faced criticism for weak implementation of the FRA. The current dispute appears to arise precisely because rights-recognition processes have either not commenced or remain incomplete in the affected villages.

The Supreme Court’s 2019 intervention strengthens the protection

The legality of the proposed evictions must also be examined in light of developments before the Supreme Court. In February 2019, the Supreme Court initially issued directions concerning claimants whose forest rights claims had been rejected. However, following widespread protests and more than a dozen legal interventions in the ongoing Wild Life First case, interventions that high-lighted the misconceived framework of the original order, the SC the Court subsequently stayed the eviction-related consequences of its own order! In fact, Sokala Gond, Nivada Rana, AIUFWP backed by Citizens for Justice and Peace, were among the first who filed an Intervention Application in the Supreme Court to prevent the mass eviction of Adivasis and traditional forest dwellers. The application argued that the FRA vests independent rights in Adivasi women, and that evictions violate their constitutional rights. Finally, MOTA itself supported these contentions (the matter is ongoing). Reports on this crucial legal intervention may be read here.

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs thereafter circulated a detailed communication to all States explaining the Court’s stay order and reiterating the necessity of reviewing wrongful rejections, ensuring proper procedures, communicating reasons for rejection, allowing appeals and preventing evictions before completion of statutory processes.

The significance of this history is often overlooked. The central concern before the Supreme Court was that thousands of claims across India may have been rejected without proper adherence to FRA procedures. The Court’s intervention effectively reinforced the principle that forest dwellers cannot be removed merely because authorities assert that they lack recognised rights.

In the case of the four Taungya villages, the issue is even stronger because these communities belong to a category specifically recognised under the FRA itself.

Historical records undermine the “encroacher” narrative

The language of “encroachment” occupies a powerful place in public discourse. Yet its application to Taungya villages is legally and historically problematic. An encroacher is ordinarily understood as a person who unlawfully occupies land without authority.

The residents of the four villages claim the opposite: that they possess long-standing documentary evidence demonstrating their lawful association with the settlements. According to representations submitted to the Assam government, residents possess Aadhaar cards, voter identity cards, Taungya allotment documents, annual khiraji pattas and even historical records linked to wartime service.

More fundamentally, the historical record demonstrates that Taungya settlements were established by state authorities themselves. Academic research on Assam’s forest villages documents how generations of landless peasants were settled within reserved forests to serve as labourers for forestry operations. These communities were denied secure tenure despite their contribution to forest administration and conservation.

The FRA was enacted precisely because Parliament recognised that such communities had suffered historical injustice.

To describe them today as encroachers without first determining their statutory rights risks reversing the very objective of the legislation.

Assam’s longstanding failure to implement the FRA

The present controversy also exposes a larger governance problem. Nearly two decades after enactment of the FRA, implementation in Assam remains deeply uneven. There have been documented persistent difficulties in recognising the rights of forest dwellers, especially among non-tribal forest village residents whose historical circumstances differ from those in central India.

Forest villages across Assam have long existed in a legal limbo. Settled by the state, dependent on agricultural cultivation, and often possessing decades of documentary evidence, many residents nevertheless remain without formal tenure security. The result has been a recurring cycle of uncertainty, conflict and eviction threats. The four villages in Lutumari Longjap Reserve Forest appear to be the latest manifestation of this unresolved problem.

The constitutional dimension

Beyond statutory violations, the issue raises constitutional concerns. The Supreme Court has consistently interpreted Article 21 of the Constitution as encompassing rights to livelihood, dignity and shelter. Communities that have lived in officially recognised settlements for generations cannot be dispossessed through administrative action that disregards statutory protections.

The FRA itself is a welfare legislation enacted to realise constitutional commitments to equality, social justice and protection of vulnerable communities. Any interpretation that permits eviction of Taungya residents before recognition of rights would undermine these constitutional objectives.

What the law requires now

The legal position emerging from the FRA, Ministry guidelines and Supreme Court proceedings is clear. Before any eviction can occur:

1. Eviction notices should be withdrawn or kept in abeyance.
2. Forest Rights Committees should be constituted in the affected villages.
3. Individual and community claims should be invited and processed.
4. Historical records relating to Taungya settlements should be examined.
5. Claims must be verified through the statutory process.
6. Appeals must be exhausted.
7. Revenue village conversion under Section 3(1)(h) must be considered.
8. No coercive action should occur until the entire process is completed.

Anything less would defeat both the text and purpose of the Forest Rights Act.

Conclusion: A test case for the Forest Rights Act in Assam

The eviction notices issued to residents of Kandapara Longjap Taungya, Padumoni Taungya, Hatijur Taungya and 9 No. Kheroni Taungya are not merely administrative notices. They represent a collision between two competing visions of forest governance.

One vision views long-settled forest communities as encroachers whose presence must be removed. The other—the vision embodied in the Forest Rights Act—recognises that many of these communities were settled, used and controlled by the state itself, and that their continued insecurity is the product of historical injustice rather than illegality.

The FRA was enacted to resolve that injustice. It specifically recognises Taungya settlements, provides for their conversion into revenue villages, and unequivocally prohibits eviction before recognition and verification of rights are completed. The Ministry of Tribal Affairs has repeatedly reaffirmed this position, and the Supreme Court’s interventions have further underscored the need for procedural safeguards.

The question before Assam is therefore not whether these communities should be evicted. The question is whether a law enacted by Parliament to protect forest dwellers will finally be implemented in the state in the manner intended. Until that process is completed, the attempt to remove residents of these Taungya villages stands on deeply questionable legal ground and risks perpetuating the very historical injustice that the Forest Rights Act was enacted to undo.

Related:

Weaponising Forest Laws: The systemic criminalisation of Tharu tribals in Lakhimpur Kheri

How FCA 2023 amendments seek to undermine Adivasi land protections guaranteed in Forest Rights Act, 2006: SC

AIUFWP to LoP Rahul Gandhi: Act now on forest rights

Forest Conservation Amendment Act, 2023: A challenge to Adivasi land rights and environmental protections

Inside India’s forest lands a battle for land and resources: Adivasis & Forest dwellers

TN: 158 people in two villages get title deeds under the Forest Rights Act, 2006

The post A test for the Forest Rights Act in Assam appeared first on SabrangIndia.

With an absence of transparency –names and identities – of deleted and new voter influx—the question we ask is this:

Are new voter registrations transparent following due process, and what criteria were implemented to simply deny existing voters their right to vote?

The Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) shows clear data errors across the country. Instead of a clear, transparent and logical process, the official figures leave 2.79 crore voters (27.9 million) unaccounted for. This means that millions have been disenfranchised without either explanation, reasons given or judicial scrutiny: besides this huge number of Indian electors have not even been properly categorised in the act of removal/deletion: are they deceased, have they shifted/moved their location (?) or do they have duplicate entries? This unilateral and arbitrary deletion/exclusion has already –in states ruled by the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – cost them survival besides the right to vote: People removed from these lists are today in danger of losing their government benefits we repeat, without any independent scrutiny by an independent judicial authority.

In West Bengal and Bihar alone, the state governments –elected on the basis of this faultily implemented SIR–have simply announced –without policy discussion or judicial scrutiny –that the ‘new voters lists’ will be regarded as the final electoral list and linked this to welfare programmes. Both states are now ruled by the extreme right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a political behemoth that has –in close collusion with a non-transparent Election Commission of India (ECI) been a “beneficiary” of this SIR process.

Put clearly, if a person’s name is removed from the voter list, their ration card is deactivated, monthly cash transfers are stopped, and even their bank accounts face cancellation. There are also local reports of the possibility of unilateral deletion from agricultural land records, especially if you are a disenfranchised voter from Murshidabad and Malda, Muslim majority districts! This policy effectively treats a deleted voter as someone who has lost their official status as a citizen without the final adjudication of their citizenship status.

State & UT wise deletion data discrepancy

The ECI’s entire 2025-2026 SIR process was/is 3-layered:

• Enumeration Phase
• Publication of Draft Roll, Claims and
• Objections Period and publication of the Final Roll.

A close scrutiny of the official electoral data spanning 14 States and Union Territories where the SIR was hurriedly conducted tells a mathematically impossible story.

This exclusive deep-dive investigation by Vote for Democracy and SabrangIndia reveals the dark holes behind the mass deletions.

The official SIR data released by the ECI for 14 States and UTs contains significant inconsistencies. While the ECI has published aggregate figures of additions and deletions, it has not provided complete details explaining how the final electoral rolls were arrived at. This makes independent verification of the data difficult.

According to the ECI final data, 5.29 crore electors were deleted during the SIR exercise. However, the ECI has not disclosed complete details regarding these electors, including the categories under which they were deleted, their constituency-wise distribution, whether all such deletions attained finality, or whether any cases remained under adjudication, appeal, or other verification processes at the time of publication of the final rolls.

1. The ECI has reported that 1.87 crore new electors were added through Forms 6 and 6A applications^[1]. However, it has not specifically disclosed the categories to which these electors belong, whether they were first-time voters, previously deleted electors seeking re-enrolment, migrated voters, overseas electors, or any other category. Nor has it disclosed the district-wise and constituency-wise break-up of these additions.
2. The SIR exercise began with 61.38 crore electors. After deleting 5.29 crore electors and adding 1.87 crore electors, the final electoral roll should have contained approximately 57.96 crore electors. However, the final electoral rolls published by the ECI show only 55.17 crore electors including 1.87 crore newly added electors, leaving an unexplained gap of about 2.79 crore “Vanished Electors”
3. Further, a total of 7.16 crore electors (5.29 crore deletions and 1.87 crore additions) were affected by the SIR process, yet the ECI has not disclosed sufficient particulars regarding their status, category, or basis of inclusion/deletion. The absence of such information raises serious concerns regarding transparency, accuracy, and the reliability of the published electoral data.

Note: We have attempted to rely on figures and facts available from the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the respective Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs). Wherever neither the ECI nor the CEOs have provided the relevant data, we have been compelled to rely on information reported in the press, as no official alternative is available to the public. Since the ECI has not made the complete data available in a scientific and statistically verifiable format, it has become necessary to depend on multiple secondary sources for the purposes of this analysis.

Who then are these unexplained 5.29 crore final voters from 14 states, what has been the process followed for their inclusion into the final Voter’s List? The Table below explains the illogical process of deletions/inclusions, state-wise[2]:

Total deletion in SIR across the 14 States/UTs and Form 6/6A/additions

Bihar

The final press release^[4] of the ECI related to Bihar dated September 30, 2025 stated 3.66 lakh names were permanently deleted after detailed statutory verification, while 21.53 lakh eligible electors were added through Form-6 (First Time Voter) applications during claims-and-objections process. We have downloaded the press release and it may be accessed here. As a result, the final electoral roll stood at approximately 7.42 crore electors. At first glance, the Commission presented these figures as evidence of a successful correction mechanism that enabled genuine electors to re-enter the electoral database. However, a closer examination of the numbers reveals a significant discrepancy.

The pre-SIR electoral roll contained 7.89 crore electors, whereas the finalised roll contained 7.42 crore electors. This represents a net reduction of approximately 47 lakh electors. Yet the numerical explanation offered by the Commission does not fully account for this decline.

If 3.66 lakh names were permanently removed after verification and 21.53 lakh electors were subsequently added, the total deletions and additions totals 25.19 lakh electors. However, the final roll has an unexplained deficit of 21.81 lakh Voters whose removal/absence has simply not been explained by the ECI!

Questions raised in Investigation:

• Who are these Voters, from which Districts in Bihar and what is their gender and other identity?
• Do the Bihari and Indian people not deserve to know?

Conclusion: The entire SIR process therefore has been clouded in opacity. Reasons are that there has been absence of any clarity on the following category-wise distinctions and therefore no reconciliation of possible overlaps:

A. The ECI has not disclosed who these newly added electors are or the districts and constituencies in which they have been added. This information is crucial for understanding the impact of the SIR process.

B. The ECI has stated that electors whose names were deleted during the SIR Enumeration process may seek re-enrolment by filing Form 6

C. However, Form No. 6 [only for the registration of new voter as amended], as amended[5] by the Ministry of Law and Justice through the Notification dated 17.06.2022, requires every applicant to declare that he or she has never been enrolled as an elector before. This creates a serious difficulty for persons whose names were deleted during the SIR process. Such individuals were previously registered voters and therefore cannot truthfully make a declaration that they were never electors.

D. The requirement effectively compels deleted electors to submit a false declaration in order to seek re-enrolment. This is particularly concerning because the ECI’s own guidelines warn against furnishing false information or making incorrect declarations in electoral forms.

E. Form 6a additions ( Overseas Voters-(New Voters post 2011/shifted Voters) who and in which districts/constituencies they have been added: Form 6a additions ( Overseas Voters) who and in which districts/constituencies have this category of voters been added

F. Form 7 (permanent deletions by a process initiated by others) with no details of the veracity or transparency of the process – who has been removed and from which districts/constituencies they have been removed;

G. Form 8 relates to shifting of residence/correction of entries in existing electoral roll)– which Voters have been removed on accordance of shifting and from which districts/constituencies they have been removed & which Voter details have been corrected.

Please note that giving any false statement made in the DECLARATION portion is a punishable offence under Section 31 of the Representation of People Act 1950 with imprisonment with term which may extend to one year or with fine or with both);

Declaration form can be seen/accessed here.

West Bengal

On February 28, 2026, the Chief Electoral Officer, West Bengal, released a press release^[6] announcing the publication of the final electoral roll and electorate data. In West Bengal, the baseline electorate started at 7,66,37,529 names. The Commission notified deletions in the Draft Roll of 58,20,899 Voters, which, thereafter, inexplicably ballooned to a Final Deletion figure of 83.86 Lakh names—an un-categorised surge of over 25.65 Lakh voter removals.

When applying the documented Final Deletions and adding the 1,82,036 new voters from Form 6/6A, the mathematically expected final roll should logically total 6,84,33,565 (7,66,37,529 – 83.86 Lakh + 1,82,036). Instead, the published data of General Electors post SIR in West Bengal[7] depicts the same to be 6,44,52,609.

This creates an unexplained expulsion/ decrease in the Electoral Rolls of 39,80,956 electors, proving that the final published database does not reconcile with the documented additions and removals.

Questions raised in Investigation:

• Who are these 39, 80, 956 Voters, from which Districts in Bengal and what is their gender and other identity?
• Do the Bengali and Indian people not deserve to know?

(Even if we count the 27.10 lakh removed on basis of “logical discrepancies”, the figures leave an unexplained gap of 12, 70, 956 electors, a number still unexplained given the mathematical subtraction.)[8]

Conclusion: The entire SIR process therefore has been clouded in opacity. Reasons are that there has been absence of any clarity on the following category-wise distinctions and therefore no reconciliation of possible overlaps:

Uttar Pradesh

The electoral database for Uttar Pradesh began with a pre-SIR electorate of 15, 44, 30,092 voters (15.44 crore). According to the Election Commission’s final SIR data published on April 10, 2026[9], 2, 88, 74, 067 names were deleted from the Draft Roll, while 2, 04, 45, 300 names were ultimately deleted in the Final Roll. The Commission therefore recorded that there has been an addition of 84, 28, 767 electors between the Draft and Final Rolls which may have occurred due to redressal hearings, or registrations through Forms 6 and 6A. However, the ECI has failed to published the category wise addition of 84, 28, 767 electors in the Final Electoral Roll that now stands at 13, 39, 84,792 voters (13.40 crore).

Link to the downloaded document: https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042536090402459712?s=20

The official figures for Uttar Pradesh reveal a striking anomaly! The electorate, after the conduct of the SIR in the state,  exactly equals the pre-SIR electorate minus the final deletions (15, 44, 30, 792 – 2,04,45,300 = 13,39,84,792). In other words, the final roll can be fully explained without accounting for a single one of the 84, 28, 767 newly added electors. This implies an unexplained increase of 84, 28, 767 electors (84.29 lakh)—a figure for which no corresponding category of deletion or adjustment has been disclosed in the published data.

Questions raised in Investigation:

Again, vis a vis Uttar Pradesh (UP) we ask who are these 84, 28, 767 voters and do the people of UP and India not deserve to know their names and the districts where they have been added/included as Voters?

Conclusion: Such a massive number of additions without granular data on categories deleted and added, and how, raised more questions than it answers

Link to the downloaded document: https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042535765822050811?s=20

Assam

Similarly, in Assam[10] what was conducted was a different process. Here, in this state already racked by a Citizenship Crisis of unspeakable dimensions, what took place was a Special Revision (SR) of the rolls. The difference between the SIR and SR is this: Updation of the existing Electoral Rolls takes place through house-to-house visits. Hence in this north-easten state, as many as 29656 BLOs (Block Level Officers) conducted the exercise and visited the homes of 2,52,02,775 electors present in the pre-SR rolls. In addition a new category of persons, BLAs (Block Level Agents) assisted the process. [This category of persons while open to all political parties was criticised as favouring the ruling BJP who have a formidable network of “Panna Pramukhs” (area wise agents). These BLAs were “trained” by the Election Commission through a new initiative.]

Link to the downloaded document: https://newsonair.gov.in/eci-publishes-final-voter-list-for-special-revision-in-assam-extends-west-

The Draft electoral rolls published on December 12, 2025 after the Special Revision contained 2, 52, 01, 624 electors. Only 1151 electors, according to the ECI were deleted in total at this stage from the existing rolls. However, a scrutiny of the Final Rolls published on February 10, 2026 contained 2, 49, 58.139 electors. This significant deletion, that is the removal of 2, 43, 485 electors after the Draft Rolls were published has not been explained or defined by the ECI.

Reasons for the removal of these Voters and details of the hearings and adjudications have not been made public. No details are available about the persons and process who filed objections for such a large number of electors after the publication of the Draft Roll in Assam. The actual published final roll is 2,49,58,139, presenting a structural reduction of 2,44,636 electors that are missing from the final elector roll.

Questions raised in Investigation:

Put differently, our investigation of the available official numbers from the ECI shows that as many 2,44,636 Voters have disappeared from the Final Voters list and these include some of those originally dropped at the Draft Roll stage as also some from the Form 6/6A additions!

• Do the people of Assam and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Assam they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Gujarat

Pre-SIR, the state of Gujarat contained 5,08,43,436 electors. However, the Draft Electoral Rolls published the names of 4,34,70,109 electors. Around 73.7 Lakh (73,72,711) names of the electors were deleted in the Draft Roll initially, in the final roll published^[11] on February 17, 2026 the number recorded was 4,40,30,725 electors ECI’s official figures reveal that there were 5.60 Lakh additions through various modes including Form 6/6A.

Link to the downloaded document: https://newsonair.gov.in/election-commission-of-india-releases-final-electoral-roll-for-gujarat/

Question raised in Investigation:

Examining these figures leads to the following mathematical conclusion: an expected final electoral database of 4,40,30,725 electors and 68,12,711 were the final deleted voters. (68,12,711 + 5.60 Lakh = 73,72,711 electors).

The Gujarat figures reveal that the initial draft deletion of 73,72,711 electors in the Draft Roll and 68,12,711 final deletions & about 5.60 lakh additions in the Final Roll. However, the published data does not clarify whether these 5.60 lakh additions were entirely fresh inclusions through Forms 6/6A or whether some were electors initially omitted from the Draft Roll and later restored/re-enrolled. The Election Commission has also not published a category-wise reconciliation showing how many deletions occurred through Form 7, how many claims were accepted, how many cases remain under adjudication, or how many electors were restored. In the absence of such data, the movement of electors between deletion, restoration, and addition categories cannot be independently verified.

Question raised in Investigation:

However, the published SIR Final Roll is 4,40,30,725. This again leaves an unexplained decline in deletions of a 5.60 lakh Voters.

Do the people of Gujarat and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Gujarat they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Madhya Pradesh

Before the SIR exercise, Madhya Pradesh had 5.74 crore registered voters. After the draft voter list was published on December 23, 2025, the Election Commission reported having received enrolment forms of 5,31,31,983 electors: ECI explained that as many as 42,74,160 deletions were carried out due to non-receipt of forms. A point to note is: It is strange that not even a single enrolment form received was rejected!. Another curious fact is that in MP –something not observed from an analysis in other states–as many as 8, 49, 082 electors who failed to submit enrolment forms were permitted “re-entry” into electoral rolls during the adjudication process after the publication of the Draft Rolls.

The final figures for the state, released by the ECI on February 21, 2026[12], the Commission recorded 34,25,078 final deletions and 8,49,082 new voters added through various modes including acceptance of Forms 6 and 6A.

Link to our document: https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025184572451836070?s=20

Despite the abovementioned figures, the published Final Voter List contains only 5,39,81,065 voters.

Question Raised in Investigation

The Madhya Pradesh (MP) figures do not fully reconcile. Starting SIR with 5.74 crore electors and after 34,25,078 final deletions and 8,49,082 additions, the expected final electorate should be significantly higher than the published figure of 5,39,81,065.

The data also shows that 8,49,082 electors who had initially not submitted enrolment forms were later brought back during adjudication. However, the Election Commission has not explained how these electors were classified, nor has it accounted for the gap between the expected and published final figures, leaving a portion of the electorate mathematically unexplained.

Do the people of Madhya Pradesh (MP) and India not deserve to know as to what were the specific factors that created such an accurate process (unlike other states) that reflected the fact that all enrolment form were absolutely in-order?

Do they not have any right to know as to who were the actual new electors added through the SIR process and from which districts in Madhya Pradesh (MP) they fall?

Also, who were such old electors who had been compelled to re-enrol through the Form 6 and 6A process that essentially entails making a false declaration that they were not previous voters and from which districts in Madhya Pradesh (MP) they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Chhattisgarh

Before the SIR exercise, Chhattisgarh had about 2.12 crore registered voters. The Draft Electoral Rolls published after the first stage of scrutiny by the ECI published 1, 84, 95, 920 names. Thus, the Draft Voter List recorded 27.34 lakh deletions.

In the final figures published on February 21, 2026, the Election Commission reported a further deletion of 1,08,807 electors from the Draft Rolls while at the same time it added 2, 34, 994 new voters added through inclusions of the Forms 6 and 6A categories. Based on these numbers, voters clearly have been deleted without any category-wise explanation for the deletions.

However, the published final voter list contains only 1, 87, 30, 914 voters. This leaves an unexplained gap of nearly 25.95 lakh voters whose status is not explained in the published data. The figures do not clarify whether these voters were deleted, carried forward, kept under adjudication, or removed through any other category.

Link to our document: https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025108711291650148?s=20

Question Raised in Investigation

• Do the people of Chhattisgarh and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Chhattisgarh they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Rajasthan

The SIR data of Rajasthan presents one of the clearest inconsistencies in the published figures. Before the SIR exercise, the state had 5,48,84,479 registered voters as per the ECI figure. The electors published in the Draft Electoral Rolls were 5,04,71,324 voters. The number of electors reflected in the final figures published^[13] on February 21, 2026 showed total 31,36,286 deletions and 2,42,760 further deletions from the draft rolls and 12,91,365 additions through Forms 6 and 6A but the status of the rest 8,56,304 electors remains unclear due to the lack of any specific classification or explanation regarding these addition) in those rolls.

There are discrepancies however. The Voters s shown by the ECI before the conduct of the SIR is less by 2,28,264 electors than the figure shows by the central CEO in its press releases. The data also fails to clearly account for the whereabouts and categorised figure of over 31 lakh-deleted electors. This discrepancy itself raises more questions than it answers!

Link to our document: https://cms.patrika.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SIR-Final-Publication-Rajasthan.pdf

Question Raised in Investigation

The published data does not explain this difference or whereabouts of deleted voters nor the reasons behind deletions/discrepancies.

• Do the people of Rajasthan and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Rajasthan they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu began the SIR exercise with 6,41,14,587 voters. The Draft Voter List removed 97, 37, 831 names, reducing the electorate to 5,43,76,756. During the claims and objections period, 27.53 lakh voters were added through Forms 6 and 6A, while another 4.23 lakh names were deleted.

The Final Voter List published on February 23, 2026[14] stood at 5,67,07,380 voters, reflecting a net and unexplained deduction of 74,07,207 voters from the pre-SIR electorate.

Link to our document: https://x.com/airnewsalerts/status/2025924114599600147?s=20\

Question Raised in Investigation

• Do the people of Tamil Nadu and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Tamil Nadu they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Kerala

Kerala had 2,78,59,855 voters as per CEO Kerala when the SIR exercise began in November 2025. The Draft Voter List published^[15] on December 23, 2025 excluded 24,17,503 names classified as absent, dead or shifted, bringing the electorate down to 2,54,42,352 in the draft list. During the verification process, notices were issued to 19.32 lakh voters to establish their link with the 2002 electoral roll, while 17.56 lakh voters underwent hearings over logical discrepancies.

After objections were considered, 15, 11, 292 voters were added and 53,229 more names were deleted. The Final Electoral Roll published^[16] on February 21, 2026 contains 2,70,52,007 voters, a net reduction of 9,59,440 voters from the pre-SIR electorate that is unexplained by category or reasoning.

Link to our document: https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/draft-electorate-23-12-2025.pdf; https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/final_electorate_sir_2026.pdf

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of transparency and clear reasoning given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Kerala and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Goa and Andaman & Nicobar Islands

Goa had 11,85,034 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The Draft Voter List published on December 16, 2025 removed 1,00,042 names, bringing the voter count down to 10,84,992. The Election Commission also identified 1,82,403 voters as “unmapped” and 58,923 voters as having “logical discrepancies”, whose cases were later examined through notices, hearings and document checks. During the claims & objections period, 12,166 new voters were added (Form 6,6A), while 39,592 names were finally deleted, including 35,780 voters declared ineligible after scrutiny.

The final voter list published^[17] on February 21, 2026 contained 10, 57, 566 voters.

Link to our document: https://ceogoa.nic.in/PDF/SIR2026/press-note-Final-publication.pdf

Question raised in Investigation:

However, the figures raise a basic question that if 1, 00, 042 names were removed in the Draft List, why do the final figures show only 39,592 deletions? The published data does not clearly explain what happened to the remaining voters who were initially removed, or how the large number of unmapped and discrepancy-flagged voters were ultimately accounted for in the final roll.

• In the absence of clear reasoning given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Goa and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

The Andaman & Nicobar Islands[18] had 3,10,404 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published on December 23, 2025 removed 64,014 names, reducing the electorate to 2,46,390. During the claims and objections period, 16,919 voters were added through Forms 6, 6A and 8, while 5,269 names were deleted.

The final voter list published on February 21, 2026 contains 2,58,040 voters, matching the additions and deletions recorded after the draft stage. However, compared to the pre-SIR electorate, the final roll is lower by 52,364 voters. While the final deletion figure records only 5,269 removals, the published data does not explain how this overall reduction of 52,364 voters was arrived at, or how many of the 64,014 names deleted in the draft list were restored after verification or not.

Linkto our document: https://x.com/Andaman_Admin/status/2025442063752511792?s=20

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of clear reasoning’s given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Andaman & Nicobar and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Puducherry

Puducherry had 10, 21,578 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published on December 16, 2025 removed 1,03,467 names, reducing the electorate to 9,18,111 voters. During the claims and objections period, 41,492 voters were added, 16,619 more names were deleted, and 1,227 voters were marked as shifted outside the state.

Link to our document: https://x.com/ceopuducherry/status/2022544949041074407?s=20

The final electoral roll published on February 14, 2026[19] contains 9,44,211 voters. While the final figures broadly reconcile with the draft roll and subsequent additions, the data leaves key questions unanswered. Of the 1,03,467 voters removed at the draft stage, the final roll remains lower than the pre-SIR electorate by 77,367 voters. The published data does not explain how many of the initially deleted voters were restored, how many of the 41,492 additions were genuinely new voters or some of were existing voters? and how many were previously deleted electors who were later reinstated after verification.

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of clear reasoning’s given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Puducherry and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Lakshadweep

Lakshadweep had 57,813 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published^[20] on December 16, 2025 removed 1,429 names, including 705 deceased voters, 210 permanently shifted voters, 472 duplicate enrolments, 41 untraceable or absent voters, and one voter who refused to sign, reducing the electorate to 56,384 voters.

Link to our document: https://www.facebook.com/100064880013259/posts/press-note-14022026-publication-of-final-electoral-roll-2026election-commission-/1363754245797230/

During the claims and objections period, 1,270 voters were added and 47 more names were deleted. The final electoral roll published on February 14, 2026 contains 57,607 voters. While the final figures broadly reconcile, the electorate remains 206 voters lower than the pre-SIR roll. The published data does not indicate whether these 206 voters were deleted during verification, shifted to another category, or excluded for any other reason.

Note: It was difficult to obtain all the relevant PDFs and official records, as several final press notes, bulletins and related documents were not readily available on the ECI website. For this reason, data was compiled from official social media posts of the Election Commission and Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs), CEO websites, press notes, and other official source links. References to the deletion of SIR bulletins and press notes from the ECI website have not been included here, as the analysis relies only on documents and data that could be independently accessed from official sources.

The major difficulty in the data analysis has been the inconsistency between the data published by the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the respective Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) on the same issue. In many instances, explicit data has not been provided, and even the data released by the ECI reveals discrepancies. Further, the data has not been presented in a uniform format across States and Union Territories. The ECI has failed to adhere to basic principles of data management and statistical reporting, as the data should be presented in a consistent, sequential, and standardised manner to enable accurate analysis and comparison.

No final transparency or clarity on what were the categories of removals

A macro-analysis of the database across all 14 States and UTs (except Assam) reveals a severe systemic failure in the reconciliation of electoral figures, showing that there is absolutely no final match or clarity on what were the categories of removals.

In sum, the pre-revision electorate across these States/UTs stood at 61.38 Crore. While subtracting the officially declared total “Final Deletions” of 5.29 Crore and adding the 1.87 Crore newly added Form 6 and Form 6A voters etc.—the expected final database should logically rest at 57.96 Crore.( Leaving aside Assam).

However, the officially published SIR Final Roll aggregates to a figure which is at variance and the figures given by various CEOs and the ECI at different occasions does not match and different claims are made that makes the picture too hazy to be recognized.

This failure to mathematically bridge the gap between the initial and final rolls leaves a staggering, un-reconciled macro-level discrepancy of Crores of electors. Every single state exhibits this structural dissonance. These unexplained numerical variances expose a hidden layer of alleged database manipulation. The officially recorded final deletions are completely out of consonance with the initial draft deletions 7.33 Crore and the actual net modifications executed on the ground.

Instead of providing a transparent, categorised breakdown of these removals—such as designating them as deceased, permanently shifted, or duplicate entries—the data reflects opaque, un-categorised bulk adjustments. The introduction of the clause of logical discrepancies midway in West Bengal , that to applied discriminately and arbitrarily makes the exercise smack of pre-determination and partisan administrative “purging” of the Electoral Roll and therefore the Constitutional Right to Vote!

SIR deletions linked to welfare benefits

The newly elected BJP governments in West Bengal and Bihar indicated that persons whose names were deleted from electoral rolls might also lose access to welfare benefits. In West Bengal, ministers stated that individuals removed through the SIR process would not be eligible for government schemes, though those whose cases are pending before appellate tribunals and certain applicants under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) would continue to receive benefits

The West Bengal government has weaponised the outcomes of the SIR to aggressively filter beneficiaries under the public distribution system. By instructing the food and supplies department to mark the ration cards of deleted voters as inactive, the state has explicitly equated electoral exclusion with nutritional deprivation.

Individuals marked as absent, shifted, duplicate, or dead in the draft lists, alongside unmapped voters and those removed post-adjudication, now face immediate ineligibility for fundamental food security. While temporary reprieves exist for those navigating the labyrinthine appellate tribunals or seeking refuge under the Citizenship Amendment Act, these are mere pauses in a broader trajectory of exclusion. These administrative decisions post-SIR extends beyond food supplies, with over thirty lakh beneficiaries of a targeted cash transfer scheme for women also rendered ineligible following their removal from the voter database in West Bengal.

In Bihar, Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary said that persons deleted from the electoral roll would be ineligible for ration and other welfare schemes, and even suggested that their bank passbooks could be cancelled in due course. The announcements have sparked concerns because the Election Commission has consistently maintained before the Supreme Court that exclusion from the electoral roll does not amount to a determination of citizenship and does not terminate an individual’s citizenship status. The move to link deletion from the electoral roll with denial of welfare benefits raises serious legal concerns, as it effectively treats exclusion from the voter list as proof of non-citizenship without any formal determination of citizenship status.

ECI launched SIR Phase-III

Following the unexplained mass deletion of voters in earlier phases, the Election Commission has now launched the controversial SIR Phase-III across 16 States and 3 UTs. The states included in this phase are Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana, and Uttarakhand. The Union Territories covered are the National Capital Territory of Delhi, Chandigarh, and Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman & Diu and temporarily leaving out only Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, and Ladakh. The above States/UTs covering a total electorate of 36.73 crore voters.

While the reasons behind the deletions in the first two phases remain unclear, the exercise is now being expanded to a much larger population based on the same non-transparent and unaccountable process. The SIR process conducted in 2025-26 and now expanded to other states is a violation of both Election Law and Rules.

The Commission must account for every voter affected by the revision process. In an exercise of this scale, even a single voter cannot disappear into the statistics. The responsibility lies squarely with the Election Commission to ensure that no citizen is wrongly removed from the electoral rolls and deprived of the right to vote through a hurried and heavy handed revision process.

Instead what the ECI has already done is snatched away the Right to Vote from 27.9 million Indians without rigour or reason.

^[1] New 18 years plus voters, However ECI wanted those who were deleted in SIR Enumeration to apply on Form No. 6 and Supreme Court directed the Political Parties to activate their BLAs to help such electors who stood deleted

[2] https://www.elections.tn.gov.in/ASD_19122025.aspx

^[3] General electors notified post SIR in declaration of election

^[4] https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2173316&reg=48&lang=2

[5] https://ceoodisha.nic.in/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Amendments-ER-Press-Points-.pdf

^[6] https://ceowestbengal.wb.gov.in/Downloads/News/Final%20Press%20Note%20CEO-PN-05-2026.pdf: in the declaration of elections vide release dated 15.03.2026 by ECI

[7] https://ceowestbengal.wb.gov.in/Downloads/News/Final%20Press%20Note%20CEO-PN-05-2026.pdf

[8] When this staggering number of 27. 10 lakh of Voters excluded under the vague/unexplained category of “logical discrepancy was pointed out to the Supreme Court, the SC inexplicably ruled that they could be denied their right to vote this election, 2026, and brought back in the next election if their case is found to be genuine!!

[9] https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042535765822050811?s=20

[10] https://newsonair.gov.in/eci-publishes-final-voter-list-for-special-revision-in-assam-extends-west-

^[11] https://newsonair.gov.in/election-commission-of-india-releases-final-electoral-roll-for-gujarat/

[12] https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025184572451836070?s=20

^[13] https://cms.patrika.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SIR-Final-Publication-Rajasthan.pdf

[14] https://x.com/airnewsalerts/status/2025924114599600147?s=20\

^[15] https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/draft-electorate-23-12-2025.pdf

^[16] https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/final_electorate_sir_2026.pdf

^[17] https://ceogoa.nic.in/PDF/SIR2026/press-note-Final-publication.pdf

[18] https://x.com/Andaman_Admin/status/2025442063752511792?s=20

[19] https://x.com/ceopuducherry/status/2022544949041074407?s=20

^[20] https://ceolakshadweep.gov.in/Users/download_pdf_press_notes/UHJlc3MgTm90ZS0gUHVibGljYXRpb24gb 2YgRHJhZnQgRWxlY3RvcmFsIFJvbGwgKDEpLnBkZg==

Related:

Judgement delivered, paradox prevails: every voter a citizen, but what is the fate of 51.8 million excluded?

SC greenlights SIR, upholds ECI’s power to revise electoral rolls

The Bihar Verdict 2025: How an election was engineered before votes were cast

The post Exclusive Investigation SIR: How many voters did the ECI actually disenfranchise? Why do final figures show inexplicable ‘additions’? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The proceedings reveal a complex intersection of competing constitutional and governance concerns. On one hand lies the Court’s continuing concern regarding the rights of pedestrians, the accessibility of public spaces, and the obligation of public authorities to enforce existing laws regulating street vending. On the other hand lies the reality that the regulatory framework created by Parliament in 2014 to govern street vending has remained only partially implemented in Mumbai for more than a decade. The result is that many of the individuals who are now the subject of identification and enforcement exercises exist within a legal and administrative landscape shaped not merely by unlawful occupation of public spaces, but also by prolonged governmental failure to complete the statutory processes contemplated under the Street Vendors Act.

The Bombay High Court’s intervention must therefore be understood against a much broader historical backdrop. The present controversy is not simply about the existence of unauthorised hawkers. It is also about the consequences of a decade-long failure to fully implement a law that was specifically enacted to regulate street vending while protecting the livelihoods of some of India’s most economically vulnerable workers.

The regulatory framework and the incomplete implementation of the Street Vendors Act

The Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 represented a significant departure from earlier approaches to street vending. Prior to the enactment of the legislation, vendors across Indian cities often existed in a precarious legal position. Despite performing an essential economic function and serving millions of urban consumers, they were frequently treated as encroachers and subjected to eviction drives, confiscation of goods, harassment, and arbitrary displacement.

The Act sought to establish a more balanced framework. Rather than treating street vendors as a problem to be removed, Parliament recognised vending as a legitimate occupation and sought to regulate it through a system of surveys, registration, certification, designated vending zones, and representative Town Vending Committees. The legislation was premised on the understanding that public spaces could be managed in a manner that balanced urban planning concerns with the constitutional protection of livelihood.

The Town Vending Committee was intended to serve as the cornerstone of this framework. These committees were tasked with conducting surveys, identifying eligible vendors, issuing certificates of vending, recommending vending zones, and ensuring periodic review of the regulatory framework. Importantly, the Act contemplated that surveys would be conducted at regular intervals and that the regulatory system would remain responsive to changing urban realities.

In Mumbai, however, the implementation of the Act remained deeply uneven. Although surveys were initiated, subsequent stages of the process progressed slowly. Certification exercises remained incomplete, disputes arose regarding eligibility, and the functioning of Town Vending Committees became a recurring source of controversy. As a result, the comprehensive regulatory framework envisaged by Parliament never fully materialised. The consequences of these delays have become central to the present litigation.

The centrality of the 2014 survey and the status of 99,435 vendors

One of the most significant figures repeatedly referred to in the Bombay High Court proceedings is 99,435. This number derives from the survey conducted by the BMC following the enactment of the Street Vendors Act and has become the foundation of the Court’s recent directions, discussed below in detail, regarding identification and verification.

The significance of this figure cannot be understood without appreciating the broader statutory context. The survey was intended to form only one component of a larger regulatory process. It was expected that the information gathered during the survey would subsequently be used to determine eligibility, issue certificates, designate vending zones, and create a functioning regulatory system overseen by Town Vending Committees.

However, while approximately 99,435 applicants were surveyed, the larger statutory process remained incomplete. Many vendors who participated in the survey never received final vending certificates. Others continued to operate in a legal grey zone, possessing survey records or acknowledgements but lacking the formal documentation contemplated under the Act.

Vendor organisations have repeatedly argued that this prolonged administrative uncertainty created a category of workers whose relationship with the law remained unresolved. They were neither fully regularised nor formally excluded. Instead, they existed within a system that acknowledged their presence but failed to conclusively determine their legal status.

This unresolved situation became particularly visible during the COVID-19 pandemic. Street vendor organisations repeatedly highlighted how incomplete implementation of the Act affected access to welfare schemes, financial assistance, and emergency relief measures. Many vendors were unable to access benefits because they lacked documentation that they had been waiting years to receive. Representatives of vendor unions pointed out that while tens of thousands had participated in official survey processes, only a small proportion had ultimately received formal recognition through certificates of vending.

Detailed report may be read here and here.

The present litigation therefore unfolds against the backdrop of a regulatory process that remains unfinished more than a decade after the enactment of the legislation.

The proceedings before Bombay High Court

The proceedings before the Bombay High Court arise from a long-running public interest litigation concerning the regulation of street vending, hawking and encroachments on roads, pavements and public spaces across Mumbai. The petition is rooted in persistent complaints that despite repeated judicial directions, large-scale unauthorised hawking continues to obstruct pedestrian movement, affect traffic circulation, impede access to railway stations, hospitals and public infrastructure, and undermine urban planning efforts. Over the years, the litigation has expanded into a broader examination of the implementation of the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014, the functioning of Town Vending Committees (TVCs), the creation of vending and non-vending zones, the conduct of surveys of eligible vendors, and the responsibilities of multiple authorities including the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), Mumbai Police, Railways and the State Government. The Court has repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with what it views as administrative inaction and the failure of authorities to establish an effective regulatory framework despite the existence of a statutory scheme.

The current phase of the litigation reflects the Court’s growing dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of municipal and police authorities in regulating street vending across Mumbai. During successive hearings, the Court examined affidavits and compliance reports submitted by the BMC and other authorities detailing enforcement actions undertaken against unauthorised hawkers. However, photographs and materials placed before the Court frequently suggested that locations identified for special monitoring continued to witness significant vending activity despite repeated eviction drives.

The Court consequently began questioning whether existing enforcement efforts were producing any meaningful or lasting results. Particular concern was expressed regarding the apparent reappearance of vendors shortly after eviction operations had concluded. According to the Court, the issue was not merely the removal of vendors but the inability of public authorities to prevent the repeated reoccupation of the same spaces.

This concern became a recurring theme across several hearings. The Court repeatedly questioned why vendors who had been removed from specific locations appeared able to return almost immediately despite the presence of municipal authorities and police personnel. The judges also expressed concern regarding the apparent disconnect between the assurances provided in court and conditions observed on the ground.

The Court increasingly viewed the issue as one involving institutional accountability. Municipal authorities pointed to challenges associated with enforcement and reoccupation. Police authorities referred to limitations arising from municipal responsibilities. The Court, however, repeatedly emphasised that the continued shifting of responsibility between agencies could not justify the persistence of conditions that had been the subject of litigation for years.

The proceedings thus gradually evolved from a discussion regarding individual instances of encroachment into a broader examination of governance failures and administrative accountability.

• October 2025: The Court signals that assurances are no longer enough

The proceedings in this petition intensified significantly during the hearing held on October 22, 2025. By this stage, the BMC had already informed the Court that it had identified twenty locations across Mumbai for focused action and monitoring. Municipal authorities asserted that steps were being taken to remove unauthorised hawkers and prevent their return.

However, photographs placed before the Court painted a different picture. Images of the area immediately outside the Bombay High Court showed that hawkers continued to occupy spaces despite repeated assurances regarding enforcement.

The Court expressed clear dissatisfaction with the situation. Justice Gadkari observed that despite repeated directions and solemn assurances from authorities, unauthorised hawkers continued to maintain a significant presence across the city. The Bench indicated that it would no longer be satisfied with general statements regarding enforcement and would instead insist upon measurable compliance.

Specific stretches, including the area from Flora Fountain to Horniman Circle, were placed under direct scrutiny. Municipal officials and police authorities were directed to ensure that these locations remained free from unauthorised hawking. The Court’s approach reflected a growing belief that the problem was not the absence of legal powers but the failure to exercise them effectively.

• November 2025: The Court expands the inquiry across Mumbai

The hearing in November 2025 marked an important shift in the Court’s approach. The issue was no longer treated as confined to a handful of locations. Instead, the Court began examining the broader condition of public spaces across Mumbai.

The Bench remarked that there appeared to be virtually no commercial district, market area or railway precinct in the city that remained unaffected by hawking. The judges questioned submissions suggesting that police personnel could not verify whether vendors possessed licences or authorisations. The Court pointed out that there was nothing preventing officers from demanding documentation and taking action against unauthorised vendors.

A recurring concern during the hearing was the phenomenon of reoccupation. According to the Court, the central problem was not merely that vendors were being removed; it was that they were returning almost immediately after enforcement operations concluded.

The Court identified twenty major locations across the city—including railway station precincts, Colaba Causeway, Linking Road, Hill Road, Mohammad Ali Road, Kurla, Ghatkopar and the route between Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus and the High Court—for continuous monitoring and enforcement, as per LiveLaw.

The hearing reflected the Court’s emerging view that the problem was systemic and required sustained institutional intervention rather than sporadic eviction drives.

• December 2025: Questions regarding political and administrative will

The Court’s frustration became more pronounced during the December 2025 hearing. The immediate trigger was the continued presence of hawkers in the vicinity of the High Court despite previous directions and the existence of a nearby police chowki. The judges openly questioned whether the State intended to comply with judicial directions at all.

Justice Gadkari remarked that the State needed to clarify whether it intended to enforce the law or permit citizens to act as they pleased. The Court also rejected suggestions that the issue should be viewed solely through the lens of vendors’ rights. While acknowledging that street vendors possess constitutional protections, the Bench emphasised that pedestrians and ordinary residents also possess rights that require protection, as per LiveLaw.

A particularly significant observation concerned the temporary clearance of the area during the swearing-in ceremony of the Chief Minister. The Court noted that authorities had demonstrated their capacity to clear the area when required but had failed to maintain those conditions thereafter. This observation reinforced the Court’s growing conviction that the persistence of the problem was not merely a question of capacity but one of sustained commitment.

• March and April 2026: The Court turns to the state’s failure to implement the act

The hearings during early 2026 marked another significant development. The Court increasingly shifted its focus from immediate enforcement failures to the larger question of why the Street Vendors Act had not been fully implemented despite having been enacted more than a decade earlier.

The most pointed criticism emerged during the hearing on April 28, 2026. When the Maharashtra Government produced a Government Resolution outlining future steps for implementation of the Act, the Court reacted sharply.

Justice Gadkari repeatedly questioned what authorities had been doing since 2014. The Bench described the Government Resolution as little more than an “eyewash” and “lip service,” observing that the State appeared to be creating implementation frameworks that should have existed years earlier, as reported by LiveLaw.

The Court was equally dismissive of statistics indicating that action had been taken against approximately 9,000 illegal hawkers. Pointing out that estimates suggested the presence of several lakh vendors across Mumbai, the Bench observed that the figures presented by the State addressed only a small fraction of the larger issue.

The hearing also highlighted concerns regarding intimidation faced by citizens who reported illegal hawking. References were made to threats, violence and retaliation against complainants. Justice Khata observed that many residents had effectively lost faith in the willingness of authorities to act.

The Court repeatedly emphasised that sufficient legal powers already existed and that the problem lay in implementation rather than legislative inadequacy.

The order may be read here.

• May 2026: The shift from enforcement to identification

The hearings conducted during May 2026 marked a significant transformation in the nature of the proceedings. Until this point, the Court’s primary concern had been enforcement. Increasingly, however, the focus shifted toward identification and verification.

The Court began examining how authorities could distinguish between vendors who formed part of the surveyed population and those operating outside the recognised framework. This discussion coincided with concerns raised regarding alleged undocumented foreign nationals, particularly Bangladeshi nationals, engaged in vending activities.

The BMC informed the Court that alleged foreign nationals residing illegally in India could not be permitted to engage in hawking and that verification exercises were necessary to identify such persons.

The Court’s response was to direct the creation of a comprehensive identification system based upon the 2014 survey database. QR-code-based identity cards were ordered for all 99,435 surveyed vendors.

The Court clarified that the issuance of identity cards would not create legal rights or confer recognition beyond existing entitlements. Rather, the purpose was to facilitate identification and distinguish surveyed vendors from persons operating outside the recognised framework.

When the BMC sought additional time for implementation, the Court expressed impatience. Justice Gadkari observed that the issue had persisted for years and that authorities could not continue to seek extensions while illegal activities allegedly continued. The Bench even suggested that the State Government allocate funds necessary to expedite the process.

The Court also directed the creation of citizen-reporting mechanisms, including dedicated WhatsApp systems, online portals and email addresses through which complaints regarding illegal hawking could be submitted.

The order may be read here.

• June 2026: Questions regarding the survey database

The hearing conducted on June 10, 2026 introduced a new dimension to the proceedings by raising questions regarding the reliability of the very database upon which the ongoing identification exercise is based.

Information placed before the Court suggested that certain individuals included within the 2014 survey records may not have been genuine hawkers and may instead have been shop owners who obtained inclusion through incorrect documentation. The Court treated these allegations seriously and directed that they be examined through an inquiry supervised by senior police officials.

This development is significant because it demonstrates that the process of verification is not limited to identifying persons outside the survey database. It also extends to examining the integrity of the database itself.

The allegations suggest that questions remain regarding the accuracy of records generated during the original survey exercise. If those records are now being used as the basis for determining legitimacy, then the reliability of the underlying data inevitably assumes considerable importance.

The June hearing therefore highlighted a broader challenge confronting the ongoing exercise. The task is not merely to distinguish surveyed vendors from unsurveyed vendors. It is also to ensure that the records being relied upon are themselves accurate and capable of supporting regulatory decisions with significant consequences for livelihoods.

The order may be read here.

The shift in the Court’s perspective

• How It Began: Public spaces, pedestrian rights, and constitutional concerns

A central feature of the Court’s reasoning, prior to May, has been its concern regarding the rights of pedestrians and the accessibility of public spaces. Throughout the proceedings, the Court has repeatedly emphasised that roads, footpaths and public areas exist primarily for public use and that authorities possess an obligation to ensure that citizens are able to access them safely and freely. Particular attention has been paid to the condition of footpaths and public thoroughfares in major commercial districts and around railway stations.

The Court has expressed concern that large sections of Mumbai’s public spaces have effectively become inaccessible to pedestrians because of encroachments and unauthorised vending activities. According to the Court, this situation raises questions not merely of urban management but also of constitutional governance.

In several hearings, the Bench linked the issue to broader concerns regarding the right to move freely and the obligation of public authorities to protect public infrastructure intended for common use. The judges repeatedly observed that the State cannot abdicate its responsibility to regulate public spaces and that continued inaction ultimately affects the rights of ordinary citizens. These concerns formed the foundation of the Court’s insistence upon stricter enforcement measures and closer monitoring of compliance.

• What It Became: The shift towards identification and verification

It is crucial to highlight that the recent 2026 proceedings have been about the Court’s increasing emphasis on identification and verification as mechanisms for regulating street vending. Earlier hearings focused primarily upon questions of encroachment and enforcement. More recent proceedings, however, have increasingly concentrated on distinguishing authorised vendors from unauthorised ones. This shift has been accompanied by directions requiring authorities to verify the identities of vendors and establish mechanisms capable of determining who falls within the recognised survey population.

The Court ultimately directed the BMC to undertake an exercise involving the issuance of QR-code-based identification cards to the 99,435 vendors included in the 2014 survey database. According to the Court, such a system would enable authorities to identify surveyed vendors and distinguish them from persons operating outside the recognised framework.

The BMC subsequently informed the Court that it had commenced the process of contacting and verifying the surveyed vendors. During the June 2026 hearing, municipal authorities indicated that the exercise remained ongoing and that additional time would be required to complete contact and verification procedures involving the entire surveyed population.

The Court has also directed the establishment of mechanisms through which members of the public can report instances of alleged illegal hawking. These measures include dedicated online portals, email addresses and WhatsApp-based complaint systems intended to facilitate direct reporting by citizens.

From a legal perspective, the State undoubtedly possesses the authority to investigate and act against persons residing unlawfully within India. However, the incorporation of migration-related concerns into litigation concerning street vending introduces a number of additional constitutional and policy considerations.

Street vending has historically been associated with economically vulnerable populations, including internal migrants, religious minorities, and workers employed within the informal economy. In recent years, several parts of the country have witnessed attempts to frame questions of livelihood, documentation and market participation through broader narratives concerning migration, citizenship and national security.

Consequently, the increasing emphasis upon identity verification raises important questions regarding the safeguards that will govern implementation. Verification exercises may be lawful and necessary for regulatory purposes, but they must remain grounded in evidence and due process. The distinction between lawful verification and profiling becomes particularly significant when questions of citizenship and migration become intertwined with questions of livelihood.

The implementation of the Court’s directions will therefore require careful attention to procedural fairness and constitutional protections.

The unaddressed issues 

• The Missing Conversation: Livelihood, informality and the original purpose of the Street Vendors Act

One striking feature of the Bombay High Court proceedings is the relative absence of sustained engagement with the livelihoods question that lies at the heart of the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014. Much of the litigation has centred on encroachments, pedestrian mobility, enforcement failures, unauthorised hawking and, more recently, identity verification. Yet the legislation itself was enacted because Parliament recognised that street vending is not merely an issue of urban management but one of livelihood, survival and economic justice. The Act emerged from decades of judicial intervention and policy reform aimed at ending the treatment of vendors as illegal occupants and recognising them instead as legitimate economic actors whose right to work required legal protection alongside reasonable regulation of public spaces.

The present dispute exposes the consequences of the State’s prolonged failure to implement that legislative vision. The fact that nearly 99,435 vendors were surveyed but large numbers remained trapped in administrative limbo for years illustrates a deeper institutional failure. These are not individuals operating entirely outside the system; they participated in official surveys, were recorded by public authorities and entered statutory processes that were never fully completed. The result has been persistent insecurity, leaving vendors vulnerable to eviction drives, confiscation of goods, extortion, loss of income and arbitrary exclusion from public spaces. These vulnerabilities became especially visible during the Covid-19 pandemic, when thousands of vendors across India struggled to access welfare measures precisely because the regulatory framework intended to formalise and protect their status remained incompletely implemented. Against this backdrop, the central question before Mumbai is not simply how to remove unauthorised hawkers, but whether the city can finally establish a regulatory regime that protects livelihoods while regulating public space in the manner Parliament originally intended, rather than perpetuating the cycle of enforcement, litigation and uncertainty that has characterised the past decade.

• Citizenship, identity and the risk of communalisation

The Bombay High Court’s emphasis on identification, verification and the removal of unauthorised vendors cannot be viewed in isolation from broader national developments in which questions of trade, livelihood and public space have increasingly become entangled with questions of religion, citizenship and belonging. Over recent years, Muslim vendors across several states have faced organised economic boycott campaigns, exclusion from markets, demands for identity disclosure and allegations linking their commercial activities to public health threats, demographic anxieties or national security concerns. During and after the Covid-19 pandemic, public campaigns urged consumers not to purchase goods from Muslim traders; villages in parts of Madhya Pradesh displayed banners barring Muslim vendors; political leaders publicly called for avoiding purchases from Muslim traders; and Muslim vendors were repeatedly subjected to suspicion and exclusion based solely on identity.

Equally significant has been the rise of informal and extra-legal identity policing. In several instances, private actors and vigilante groups have demanded identity documents, compelled traders to reveal their religious identities, pressured businesses to display religious markers, and effectively assumed functions reserved for lawful authorities. The experiences of Kashmiri traders across Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere demonstrate how quickly livelihood questions can become questions of citizenship and belonging, with vendors facing assaults, forced document checks, expulsion from localities, economic boycotts and accusations of disloyalty or terrorism. It is within this broader context that concerns arise regarding large-scale verification exercises involving Mumbai’s vendors. The Constitution undoubtedly permits lawful verification and enforcement against unauthorised activities. What it does not permit is collective suspicion, religious profiling or the transfer of verification powers to private actors. As Mumbai moves towards identifying and regulating nearly one lakh surveyed vendors, the constitutional challenge is not merely administrative. It is ensuring that verification remains a neutral legal exercise rather than becoming a mechanism through which broader anxieties about identity, migration and belonging determine who is considered entitled to participate in the city’s economic life.

The risks are not merely hypothetical. In November and December of 2025, Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) filed a complaint before the Maharashtra Director General of Police and the National Commission for Minorities after a former BJYM functionary allegedly conducted Aadhaar checks of Muslim fruit vendors at Mumbai’s Malabar Hill market while reportedly asking Hindu vendors to display saffron flags on their carts. According to the complaint, Muslim vendors were selectively required to produce identity documents, described as potential “security threats” and subjected to public scrutiny despite the absence of any legal authority to conduct such verification. CJP argued that the incident reflected a growing pattern of extra-legal identity policing in which private individuals assume state functions and transform ordinary commercial spaces into sites of religious verification and exclusion. The episode serves as a reminder that, in the absence of robust safeguards, questions of documentation and legality can rapidly acquire communal dimensions, making the manner in which Mumbai conducts its verification process as important as the exercise itself. 

Detailed report may be read here.

A case about more than hawkers

What has emerged before the Bombay High Court over the course of these proceedings is not merely a dispute concerning street vendors occupying pavements and public roads. The litigation has evolved into a broader examination of how Indian cities govern public space, how welfare-oriented legislation is implemented, and how the State manages competing claims relating to livelihoods, legality, urban order and citizenship.

The Court has undoubtedly exposed serious administrative failures. Through repeated hearings, it has highlighted the inability of municipal authorities and police agencies to develop a consistent and durable regulatory response to street vending. It has questioned a pattern of cyclical enforcement in which vendors are removed, compliance reports are filed, and the same locations are subsequently reoccupied. It has also forced public authorities to confront uncomfortable questions regarding the implementation of a statute that was enacted more than a decade ago but remains only partially realised.

Yet the proceedings simultaneously reveal a deeper contradiction at the heart of the present controversy. For years, the State failed to complete the very processes through which the legality of street vending was supposed to be determined. Surveys were conducted, databases were created and statutory mechanisms were established, but the larger framework contemplated by the Street Vendors Act remained unfinished. The current effort to distinguish between authorised and unauthorised vendors is therefore taking place within a system whose foundational processes were themselves left incomplete.

This contradiction lies at the centre of the present litigation. The problem confronting Mumbai is not solely the existence of unauthorised hawking. It is also the consequence of a regulatory regime that was never fully implemented despite clear statutory mandates. Many of the enforcement challenges now highlighted by the Court are inseparable from that history.

The significance of the case consequently extends well beyond questions of encroachment. It raises fundamental questions about the capacity of public institutions to implement social legislation, the limits of enforcement-based governance, and the role of identification and documentation in determining access to livelihoods in contemporary India. It also raises important questions about how cities balance the rights of pedestrians and residents with the economic realities of millions of informal workers who depend upon public spaces for survival.

As the litigation continues, its legacy is likely to be measured not merely by the number of hawkers removed from particular roads or footpaths. Its enduring significance may lie in whether it succeeds in prompting the creation of a regulatory framework that is lawful, transparent and effective while remaining faithful to the constitutional commitment to dignity, livelihood and equal treatment. In that sense, the proceedings have become a debate not simply about hawkers, but about the future of urban citizenship itself and the place of informal workers within India’s rapidly transforming cities.

Conclusion: A test of constitutional governance in the city

The Bombay High Court’s hawkers litigation has ultimately exposed a reality that extends far beyond pavements, encroachments and municipal enforcement. At its heart lies a fundamental governance failure: more than a decade after Parliament enacted the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014, Mumbai is still attempting to determine who is entitled to vend, where they may vend, and under what conditions. The Court’s frustration is therefore not directed merely at the presence of hawkers on public roads, but at the inability of public institutions to implement a statutory framework that was specifically designed to regulate them.

The proceedings reveal two competing truths that must be reconciled. The first is that public spaces cannot be surrendered to unregulated occupation. Footpaths, roads, railway approaches and civic infrastructure exist for public use, and the State has a constitutional obligation to ensure that they remain accessible, safe and functional. The second is that street vendors are not simply encroachers. They are workers operating within one of India’s largest informal economies, many of whom entered official surveys, participated in statutory processes and spent years awaiting the recognition and protections promised by law. Any attempt to address the former while ignoring the latter risks reducing a complex governance challenge to a narrow law-and-order problem.

What makes the present litigation particularly significant is the contradiction it has brought into sharp focus. The State is now seeking to distinguish between authorised and unauthorised vendors through records generated by a regulatory process that was itself left incomplete. Many of the enforcement difficulties highlighted by the Court today are inseparable from years of administrative delay, institutional inertia and partial implementation of the very legislation intended to resolve them. The crisis confronting Mumbai is therefore not merely one of illegal hawking; it is also the consequence of a regulatory framework that remained unfinished despite clear statutory mandates.

The Court’s recent turn towards identification and verification adds another layer of complexity. Verification may be a legitimate and necessary tool of regulation. However, its constitutional legitimacy will ultimately depend on the safeguards that accompany it. In a climate where questions of documentation, migration, citizenship and belonging increasingly shape public discourse, the distinction between lawful verification and social profiling becomes critically important. The challenge before authorities is not simply to identify vendors, but to ensure that processes designed to enforce legality do not become instruments of exclusion, discrimination or collective suspicion.

The enduring significance of this litigation will therefore not be measured by the number of hawkers removed from a particular road or market. It will be measured by whether Mumbai finally succeeds in building the regulatory system envisioned by Parliament in 2014: one that protects public spaces without criminalising poverty, regulates economic activity without destroying livelihoods, and enforces legality through transparent procedures rather than administrative improvisation. The question before the city is not simply who may sell goods on its pavements. It is whether urban governance in India can remain faithful to constitutional commitments of dignity, equality and livelihood while responding to the genuine demands of order, planning and public accountability. In that sense, this case is not merely about hawkers. It is about whether constitutional governance can succeed where a decade of institutional failure has not.

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The post Who owns Mumbai’s streets? The Bombay High Court, street vendors and a decade of regulatory failure appeared first on SabrangIndia.

NTA STATEMENT REGARDING THE ACTION ON TELEGRAM PLATFORM IN INDIA

1. The National Testing Agency (NTA) welcomes the directions issued today in respect of the Telegram platform in India. The directions, issued on recommendations of NTA are calibrated and bounded in time:

(a) a…

— National Testing Agency (@NTA_Exams) June 16, 2026

The government has justified these measures as a response to organised examination fraud, alleged paper-leak scams and misinformation campaigns. According to statements carried by Mint, WION and other media outlets, authorities identified several Telegram channels allegedly offering access to examination papers in exchange for money. The NTA further claimed that Telegram’s message-editing feature had been exploited to create fabricated evidence of paper leaks by allowing administrators to insert examination papers into older messages while retaining original timestamps.

The importance of maintaining the integrity of national examinations cannot be disputed. The future of lakhs of students depends upon a fair and credible examination process, and organised cheating networks undoubtedly deserve stringent action. However, the constitutional question raised by the Telegram ban is not whether examination fraud should be prevented. The question is whether the State can suspend access to an entire communication platform used by millions because some actors are allegedly misusing it. Once that question is asked, the government’s decision begins to appear far less straightforward than official statements suggest.

The real problem is not Telegram

The government’s explanation begins from a fundamentally flawed premise. The recurring problem in India’s examination system is not Telegram, WhatsApp or any other communication platform. Paper leaks do not originate on social media. They originate within the examination apparatus itself. Every leak necessarily begins somewhere in the chain of printing, storage, transportation, administration or distribution of examination materials. By the time a question paper appears on a messaging platform, the breach has already occurred.

Detailed report on paper leaks may be read here.

This distinction is critical because it reveals the extent to which the government’s response is directed at symptoms rather than causes. Telegram may be one of the channels through which leaked material is circulated, but it is not the source of the leak. The source lies within the institutions responsible for safeguarding examination integrity. A serious response to examination fraud would therefore focus on identifying vulnerabilities within the examination system itself: who had access to the papers, how the chain of custody was compromised, where security protocols failed and what reforms are required to prevent future breaches.

Instead, the government’s intervention directs public attention towards the platform through which information allegedly travels. This approach risks obscuring the more uncomfortable reality that examination fraud is ultimately a governance failure. Blocking Telegram may create the appearance of decisive action, but it does little to address the institutional weaknesses that make such fraud possible in the first place.

The NTA’s own explanation undermines the ban

Perhaps the most striking aspect of the government’s justification is that it appears to undermine the necessity of the measure it seeks to defend. The NTA’s own statement acknowledges that the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), state police forces and specialised cybercrime units had already identified and removed numerous Telegram channels, groups and bots allegedly involved in examination fraud. Law enforcement agencies had reportedly conducted investigations, tracked financial transactions and made arrests.

These admissions raise a difficult question for the government. If authorities were already capable of identifying specific channels and specific offenders, why was it necessary to block the entire platform? If targeted interventions were available and functioning, what justified the escalation to a nationwide platform-wide restriction affecting millions of lawful users?

The significance of these questions becomes even clearer when viewed through constitutional principles. Democracies do not permit governments to adopt the broadest possible restriction merely because it is administratively convenient. The burden lies on the State to demonstrate why less restrictive alternatives were inadequate. Yet the government’s own account suggests that channel-level takedowns, criminal investigations and targeted enforcement actions were already underway. The NTA therefore appears to have supplied the strongest argument against its own decision.

A constitutional problem of proportionality

The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that restrictions on fundamental rights must satisfy the doctrine of proportionality. In Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017), the Court made clear that even where the State pursues a legitimate objective, it must demonstrate that the measure adopted is necessary, that less restrictive alternatives are unavailable and that the benefits of the restriction outweigh the harm caused.

Preventing examination fraud is undoubtedly a legitimate objective. The difficulty lies in establishing that a nationwide platform ban was necessary to achieve it. The government’s own statements reveal the existence of multiple alternatives. Channels could be removed. Fraud networks could be investigated. Individuals could be arrested. Financial transactions could be traced. Criminal prosecutions could be initiated.

Once these alternatives are acknowledged, the constitutional burden shifts to the State to explain why they were insufficient. The public explanation offered thus far does not convincingly do so. Instead, it suggests that a platform-wide restriction was adopted despite the existence of narrower measures. That is precisely the scenario the doctrine of proportionality seeks to prevent.

What Anuradha Bhasin case actually says about internet restrictions

The Telegram ban also cannot be separated from the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India (2020). While that case arose in the context of internet restrictions in Jammu and Kashmir, the principles articulated by the Court have broader relevance for all forms of digital restrictions.

The Court recognised that access to the internet is closely intertwined with the exercise of freedom of speech, access to information, education, trade and professional activity. It held that restrictions affecting digital communications must satisfy standards of necessity and proportionality and cannot be imposed through opaque executive processes. Most importantly, the Court emphasised transparency. Orders restricting communications must be published. Citizens must know why their rights are being restricted. Affected parties must have an opportunity to challenge such restrictions before courts.

In the present instance, however, the public has largely been presented with press releases and official explanations rather than the actual legal order. The reasoning adopted by the authorities remains unavailable. Whether Telegram was given an opportunity to be heard remains unclear. Whether less restrictive alternatives were seriously considered is unknown. These omissions are not procedural technicalities; they go to the heart of the constitutional safeguards identified by the Supreme Court.

The Shreya Singhal problem

The legal basis of the government’s action raises another serious concern. The reported reliance on Section 69A of the Information Technology Act immediately invites scrutiny because the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of that provision in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) only because it was presented as a narrow and carefully structured mechanism.

The Court accepted Section 69A because it involved targeted blocking of specific information under limited circumstances and subject to procedural safeguards. Its constitutional validity depended upon its narrow scope.

The Telegram ban raises the question of whether that narrow provision is now being transformed into a sweeping power capable of disabling entire communication platforms. As the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) has argued, there is a significant difference between blocking particular content and shutting down an intermediary used by millions. If Section 69A is interpreted broadly enough to justify platform-wide restrictions, the reasoning that underpinned its constitutional validity begins to weaken considerably.

The message editing direction may be even more troubling

The direction requiring Telegram to disable its message-editing feature raises concerns that extend even beyond the platform ban itself. While the government has publicly explained why it believes the feature was being misused, it has not clearly identified the legal authority under which it can compel a platform to redesign a feature for an entire country’s user base.

This distinction matters because blocking information and redesigning technological architecture are fundamentally different exercises of power. One concerns content regulation; the other concerns direct intervention in the design of digital infrastructure.

The implications are far-reaching. If governments can order the removal of editing functions today, similar arguments could potentially be invoked tomorrow against encryption, anonymous communication or other platform features. The issue is therefore not confined to Telegram. It concerns the broader relationship between state power and digital architecture.

Another example of India’s growing shutdown culture

The Telegram ban is not an isolated incident. It forms part of a broader pattern in which communication restrictions increasingly become the preferred response to administrative challenges. Over the last decade, multiple states have suspended internet services during recruitment examinations, teacher eligibility tests and competitive entrance examinations. These shutdowns are almost always justified as temporary and necessary measures to prevent cheating.

Yet despite repeated restrictions, examination leaks continue to occur. Fraud networks continue to operate. Recruitment scandals continue to emerge.

What persists is not the effectiveness of these measures but their repetition. Instead of reforming institutions, authorities increasingly appear to restrict communications. The result is a governance model in which the burden of institutional failure is shifted onto citizens rather than addressed at its source.

The real danger is the normalisation of censorship

The most significant concern raised by the Telegram ban is not its duration but the principle it reflects. Every time the State confronts a difficult administrative problem, there appears to be a growing willingness to restrict communications as part of the solution. Each restriction is presented as temporary. Each is described as exceptional. Yet collectively they establish a troubling precedent.

Over time, extraordinary measures become ordinary ones. Communication restrictions become routine administrative tools. Fundamental rights become subject to considerations of convenience and expediency.

The future of lakhs of students deserves protection. But constitutional freedoms deserve protection as well. A secure examination system will ultimately be built through accountability, transparency, stronger institutions and effective criminal investigation—not through platform bans and communication restrictions. The Telegram ban therefore raises a question that extends well beyond NEET. It forces us to confront whether India is becoming increasingly comfortable with restricting communications whenever governance becomes difficult. If that trend continues, the consequences will be felt far beyond a single examination cycle.

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Safe harbour or shadow censorship? The battle over India’s digital speech

State-sponsored attacks of surveillance reveal an erosion on Indians’ right to privacy, especially journalists, political opposition

The post Telegram before NEET: When governance fails, censorship takes its place appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Census as a Fundamental Rights Instrument

Further, PUCL points out that “the Census is not merely a bureaucratic exercise in counting heads and tabulating assets. The Indian State fulfils its constitutional obligations to its citizens through the foundational instrument. The data collected determines the allocation of welfare entitlements, targeted poverty programmes, infrastructure investments, and, crucially, delimitation of parliamentary constituencies. The Census is therefore inseparable from the right to equality (Article 14), the right to life and dignity (Article 21), and the right of citizens to be counted truthfully as bearers of rights. To falsify Census data is not an administrative irregularity: it is a violation of fundamental rights,” the statement states.

The Ground Reality

The testimony of enumerators, government school teachers, anganwadi workers, and other frontline functionaries paints a picture of deprivation that is profoundly at odds with the government’s self-congratulatory claims.

Enumerators across Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh have reported:
– Households without toilets, where residents defecate in the open, contradicting the government’s declaration that India is Open Defecation Free (ODF).
– Households without piped or treated tap water, contradicting the Jal Jeevan Mission’s claim of near-universal household water connectivity.
– Households dependent on firewood, dung cakes, and kerosene for cooking, contradicting data on LPG connections under the Ujjwala scheme.
– Households with tin roofs being instructed to be reclassified as having concrete roofs, a naked falsification of housing conditions.
– Households without electricity or internet, contradicting claims of digital inclusion.
– Residents so impoverished and excluded from state welfare that they pleaded with enumerators to help them access basic entitlements, housing, LPG, water, pensions, that they had never received despite being counted as beneficiaries in government data.

These are not discrepancies in methodology. They are the face of structural deprivation of a welfare architecture that has been constructed on paper while millions remain without its basic provisions in reality.

The Direction to Falsify: A Grave Institutional Offence

PUCL Rajasthan draws particular attention to the letter issued on June 2, 2026 by the Director of Census Operations, Rajasthan, to all district-level functionaries, directing them to ‘verify’ and correct ‘discrepancies’. Read alongside the testimony of enumerators who have been explicitly told ‘not to select options that may show the government in a poor light’, this letter constitutes institutional cover for data manipulation.

The instruction to enumerators to check whether households practising open defecation have access to a neighbour’s toilet or a public urinal, so as to revise the classification away from ‘open defecation’, is particularly egregious. It is not enumeration; it is the manufacture of consent to a falsehood.

This is not the first time that official welfare data has been found to diverge sharply from ground realities. The SIR exercise, deletions from voter rolls, manipulated BPL lists, these form part of a consistent and dangerous pattern of state-manufactured invisibility of the poor. The Census, which carries unique constitutional weight and long-term demographic and electoral consequences, cannot be permitted to become another instrument in this edifice of official falsification.

The Vulnerability of Enumerators

PUCL states, “It is equally alarmed at the position in which frontline enumerators, government school teachers, anganwadi workers, and other contractual and regular state employees, have been placed. These individuals are being required to choose between their professional integrity and their institutional subordination. Many have raised their voices on social media at considerable personal risk. They deserve full protection, not coercion.”

The manner in which the Census exercise is being conducted entirely on digital platforms using enumerators’ personal phones, in conditions of inadequate mobile connectivity in rural and tribal areas, with grossly insufficient reimbursement (a mobile recharge of Rs. 66 has been reported from Uttarakhand) enhances this vulnerability, states PUCL.  These conditions, compounded by the simultaneous performance of regular duties, render the exercise not merely flawed but structurally compromised.

Warning

PUCL “reminds the Central and State Governments that a Census whose data is manufactured to validate governmental claims rather than to enumerate lived realities is not merely a statistical fraud, it is a political and constitutional one. The decennial Census shapes delimitation, welfare targeting, fiscal devolution, and the entire architecture of representative democracy. Falsified Census data will not only deprive the poor of entitlements they urgently need; it will corrupt the very basis of democratic representation for decades.

“The invisible poor, those without roofs, toilets, electricity, or clean water, have a fundamental right to be seen, counted, and heard by the Indian State. Their erasure from official data is not a technicality. It is a rights violation.

Hence, the organization demands:

– An immediate halt to all instructions, formal or informal, to enumerators to revise or ‘correct’ data that truthfully reflects ground conditions. The CMMS portal must not be used as an instrument of real-time surveillance to pressurise enumerators into data revision.
– A full, independent, and transparent inquiry into the letter issued by the Director of Census Operations, Rajasthan, on 2 June 2026, and all allied communications issued by Charge Officers, Sub-Divisional Census Officers, and District Coordinators in this connection.
– Guaranteed protection for all enumerators who have raised concerns about pressure to falsify data, whether on social media or through other means, against any form of institutional retaliation, transfer, or disciplinary action.
– The constitution of an independent oversight mechanism, including civil society, retired senior bureaucrats, and statisticians with no government affiliation, to audit and verify Census data at the block level before final records are compiled.
– A public statement from the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India reaffirming the constitutional obligation of the Census to capture truthful ground realities, and explicitly disavowing any instruction to enumerators to align data with government welfare scheme claims.
– Adequate material support to enumerators, including data reimbursement, dedicated time, and relief from concurrent official duties during the HLO exercise.

The detailed statement has been issued by Kavita Srivastava, national president, V. Suresh, National General Secretary and Anant Bhatnagar, PUCL state Rajasthan President among others.

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The post Falsifying the Truth: PUCL condemns the systematic manipulation of census data & suppression of ground realities in census exercise appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Dear friends,

Some newspapers reported that after a meeting with officials yesterday, Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar instructed authorities to immediately provide residence certificates to those who require them for SIR. As per a report in The New Indian Express.

However, according to the list of 11 documents released by the Election Commission for SIR, a simple “Residential Certificate” is not sufficient. The Commission specifically requires:
Permanent Residence Certificate (PRC) issued by the competent State authority
To obtain a Residential Certificate, documents such as Aadhaar, ration card, electricity/water bills, rental agreements, etc., are usually sufficient.
However, for a Permanent Residence Certificate, additional proof is required showing permanent residence in the state for more than six years. This may include long-term ration cards, property records, or evidence of having studied in the state or resided in the state for more than six years.
Only after verification of such documents can the competent authority—the Tahsildar or Deputy Tahsildar—issue the certificate.

The question is: if the government hurriedly issues certificates without fully following these requirements, will the Election Commission accept them?

The West Bengal Experience

When SIR was conducted in West Bengal, residents submitted domicile certificates issued by the state government to prove their status. Attention: These were not ordinary residence certificates but permanent residence (domicile) certificates.

However, the Election Commission initially rejected them, arguing that they did not satisfy its prescribed Permanent Residence Certificate requirements. It also ordered that even those who had already submitted domicile certificates could be issued fresh notices. This was reported here.

As a result, then Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee publicly protested and later approached the Supreme Court. Only after these developments did the Election Commission, on February 9, agree to accept West Bengal domicile certificates as SIR eligibility documents, subject to several conditions. The conditions included:

1) EROs and AEROs could accept only those residence certificates issued in accordance with the West Bengal Government Order dated November 2, 1999.

2) The certificates had to be issued only by competent authorities such as District Magistrates, Additional District Magistrates, Sub-Divisional Officers, or the District Collector of Kolkata.

3) The certificates had to be issued strictly according to government guidelines.

4) All officials were required to be informed of and comply with these guidelines.

This has been detailed here.

This demonstrates the Election Commission’s “strict” (or exclusivist) approach—even toward permanent residence certificates issued by a state government. The Supreme Court has also upheld this authority.

States like Karnataka May Face Greater Difficulties

The ordinary residence certificate referred to by the Chief Minister of Karnataka, DK Shivakumar does not meet the “Permanent Residence Certificate” requirement under SIR. Given the West Bengal experience, only a Karnataka Domicile Certificate is likely to satisfy the Commission’s Permanent Residence Certificate requirement.

However, the same conditions imposed in West Bengal may effectively apply in Karnataka as well.
Generally, to establish Karnataka domicile status, one may need to show:

– Residence in Karnataka for seven years,
– More than six years of education in Karnataka,
– Parents residing in Karnataka, or
– Ownership of property in Karnataka.

These documents must then be verified and approved by the competent authority, usually a Tahsildar or higher-ranking official.

Therefore, since the Election Commission appears determined to use SIR to remove/exclude as many people as possible from electoral rolls on technical grounds, even minor procedural lapses in obtaining domicile certificates could be treated as discrepancies and lead to rejection.

Karnataka’s Chief Electoral Officer, Ambu Kumar, has already stated that a “discrepancy” AI will be applied after submission of Enumeration Forms in Karnataka as well.

Consequently, D.K. Shivakumar’s general instruction to issue residence certificates to everyone who needs them is unlikely, by itself, to protect Dalit and other marginalized communities in Karnataka from the risks posed by SIR. For this reason, the instruction to issue residence certificates should not be viewed as a victory, nor is a cause for complacency.

Therefore, let us remember:
– A Residential Certificate does not satisfy the Permanent Residence Certificate requirement.
– Obtaining a Domicile Certificate that may satisfy the Permanent Residence Certificate requirement is not easy for many eligible members of marginalized communities.

– Documents obtained without following the proper procedure and authority may not be accepted by the Election Commission.

Let us remain alert and not get carried away

Let SIR be completely withdrawn — let democracy survive

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are the author’s personal views, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sabrangindia.

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The post Anti-SIR Activists Beware: A mere Residential Certificate does not satisfy SIR requirements appeared first on SabrangIndia.

In a judgment that may become an important reference point in India’s continuing debate over liberty and national security, a Division Bench of Justice Navin Chawla and Justice Ravinder Dudeja ruled that the constitutional guarantee of personal liberty under Article 21 cannot be indefinitely subordinated to statutory restrictions on bail.

“The appellant’s rights under Article 21 of the Constitution of India need to be balanced and may even trump the restriction imposed under Section 43D(5) of the UAPA,” the Court observed, as per LiveLaw, while setting aside a December 2024 order of the Special NIA Court that had refused bail.

The ruling, however, does not immediately secure Parvez’s freedom. He continues to remain in custody because he is also an accused in a separate NIA case registered in 2020 relating to alleged terror-funding networks in Jammu and Kashmir, where his bail plea remains pending.

The case against Khurram Parvez

Parvez, one of Kashmir’s most internationally recognised human rights defenders, was arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on November 22, 2021, during an investigation into what the agency described as a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) over ground worker network allegedly operated by a Pakistan-based handler known as Hyder alias Ali alias Yusuf.

Significantly, Parvez was not named in the original FIR registered by the NIA on November 6, 2021. His name emerged during the course of the investigation.

The NIA’s case is that Parvez, while functioning as Programme Coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) and Chairperson of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD), was allegedly involved in terrorist conspiracy “in the guise of human rights activism.”

According to the prosecution, Parvez recruited Muneer Ahmad Kataria as an overground worker for Lashkar-e-Taiba and facilitated his introduction to Pakistani handler Hyder. Kataria allegedly recruited another accused, Arshid Ahmad Tonch, creating a chain of operatives linked to the militant organisation.

The agency further alleged that Parvez was involved in gathering sensitive information regarding Indian security installations, army camps, troop movements, road conditions near the Line of Control, and details of military and paramilitary structures. Investigators claimed that information about officers involved in counter-insurgency operations was compiled into dossiers described as “High-Ranking Perpetrators.”

The NIA also relied upon emails allegedly showing contact between Parvez and Pakistani journalists who sought footage of Indian military deployment in Kashmir.

The prosecution further pointed to Parvez’s visits to Pakistan in 2007 and 2015, where he allegedly met Syed Salahuddin, chief of the Hizbul Mujahideen and a designated terrorist. Visiting cards of Hizbul functionaries recovered from JKCCS offices were also cited as incriminating material.

Additionally, the agency alleged that Parvez played an active role during the 2016 protests that followed the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani, accusing him of making speeches including slogans such as “Burhan tere janissar, beyshumaar beyshumaar“, “Go Back India“, and “India go away from Kashmir“. According to the prosecution, these activities promoted separatist sentiment and encouraged unrest.

A separate strand of the prosecution case concerns allegations that Parvez attempted to secure the release of electronic devices seized by investigators through illegal payments routed via Muneer Ahmad Kataria to former NIA Superintendent of Police Arvind Digvijay Negi, who was later arrested in a separate corruption scandal.

The approver at the centre of the case

A critical feature of the High Court’s analysis was the centrality of Muneer Ahmad Kataria, who has since turned approver. In a supplementary chargesheet filed in July 2025, Kataria claimed that he had worked as an NIA informer since 2019 and had known Parvez since 2015. He alleged that Parvez introduced him to Hyder, described him as the “Chief Operating Commander” of the Lashkar-e-Taiba’s Jammu and Kashmir module, and facilitated financial and operational links.

Kataria also alleged that Parvez paid him Rs 1.5 lakh to be passed on as a bribe to NIA officer Arvind Digvijay Negi. The High Court acknowledged that these allegations were serious. However, it emphasised that they rested substantially on the testimony of a co-accused who had become an approver and who himself claimed to have been working as an NIA informer.

“While the above statement raises serious allegations against the appellant, these allegations are based on the statement of a co-accused who has since turned approver and who himself claims to be an NIA informer. His evidence is yet to be tested in trial,” the Bench observed in Para 66 of the judgment. That observation became one of the most significant aspects of the judgment.

The Defence: Human rights work, not terrorism

Parvez’s legal team, led by Senior Advocate Tanveer Ahmed Mir, argued that the prosecution had systematically criminalised legitimate human rights documentation. The defence pointed out that many of the documents cited by investigators—including the “Structure of Violence” report and the “Alleged Perpetrators” report—were publicly available publications that had been released years earlier and remained accessible on the JKCCS website.

The “Structure of Violence” report, published in 2015, documented military and paramilitary structures in Kashmir as part of human rights research. The “Alleged Perpetrators” report, published in 2012, compiled information about officers allegedly implicated in human rights violations, much of it obtained through Right to Information requests.

The Court noted an important fact: the prosecution did not dispute that these documents had been publicly available for years. It further recorded that the “Alleged Perpetrators” report had even been shared with the Indian Army, which publicly responded to it in 2012.

The defence also argued that Parvez’s visits to Pakistan in 2007 and 2015 were undertaken openly, with valid visas, and were part of public advocacy efforts that had long been documented in the public domain.

On the allegations relating to slogans and participation in protests, the defence argued that expressions of political dissent or advocacy of self-determination cannot automatically attract anti-terror provisions unless they cross the threshold into incitement of violence or active involvement in terrorist activity.

The constitutional question

At the heart of the case lay a broader constitutional question that has increasingly confronted Indian courts: can a person accused under UAPA be kept in prison indefinitely while waiting for trial?

Section 43D (5) of the UAPA creates one of India’s toughest bail standards. Courts are ordinarily prohibited from granting bail if the accusations appear prima facie true on the basis of the chargesheet and case diary.

The High Court devoted substantial attention to recent Supreme Court jurisprudence on this issue. The Bench revisited and relied upon the landmark decision in Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb, where the Supreme Court held that constitutional courts retain the power to grant bail when prolonged incarceration threatens fundamental rights.

Quoting extensively from Najeeb, the High Court reiterated that statutory restrictions “will melt down where there is no likelihood of trial being completed within a reasonable time and the period of incarceration already undergone has exceeded a substantial part of the prescribed sentence.” (Para 52)

The Court also examined the Supreme Court’s more recent judgment in Gulfisha Fatimav, which cautioned that delay alone cannot automatically justify bail in every UAPA case and that courts must conduct a contextual assessment that takes into account the nature of allegations, stage of proceedings, causes of delay and risks associated with release.

Yet the Bench also referred to the Supreme Court’s subsequent observations in Syed Iftikhar Andrabi, where a three-judge bench strongly reaffirmed the constitutional foundations of bail.

The Supreme Court had observed in Andrabi: “‘Bail is the rule and jail is the exception’ is not merely an empty statutory slogan. It is a constitutional principle flowing from Articles 21 and 22 of the Constitution and the presumption of innocence.”

Detailed analysis of Andrabi judgment may be read here.

The High Court further noted that although the broader question regarding the relationship between Article 21 and Section 43D (5) has now been referred to a larger Bench of the Supreme Court, existing precedent continues to bind constitutional courts.

Four-and-a-half years without trial

The factor that ultimately proved decisive was the extraordinary delay in the proceedings. The Court recorded that Parvez had been incarcerated since November 22, 2021. Despite spending almost four-and-a-half years in prison, the case had not even crossed the stage of arguments on framing charges.

The prosecution proposed to examine 197 witnesses if charges were eventually framed. The Court observed that there was “no likelihood” of the trial concluding in the foreseeable future. The judges therefore considered the allegations, the stage of proceedings, the constitutional guarantee of liberty, and the reality of the judicial process together.

” We have taken note of the above allegations and the defence of the appellant, only to highlight that they must be tested against the long period of incarceration of the appellant and the fact that there is no likelihood of the trial ending soon as also against the yardstick of bail being the rule, while denial thereof being an exception. The appellant‟s rights under Article 21 of the Constitution of India need to be balanced and may even trump the restriction imposed under Section 43D(5) of the UAPA.” (Para 71)

The Court added that continued incarceration under these circumstances raised serious Article 21 concerns.

Disability as an additional ground

The Bench also gave weight to Parvez’s physical disability. Parvez lost his leg in a landmine explosion in Kupwara in 2004 while participating in election-monitoring work and has used a prosthetic limb ever since. Although the NIA argued that his disability had not prevented him from engaging in extensive travel and activism, the Court concluded that his condition nevertheless entitled him to special consideration.

“We are also to keep in mind that the appellant is infirm. Though the learned SPP has emphasised that his infirmity has not deterred the appellant from still indulging in activities, which he describes as being anti-national, the fact remains that the appellant is infirm and deserves that special consideration,” the Bench held in Para 73.

Bail granted, but under strict conditions

Having balanced the seriousness of the allegations against constitutional concerns arising from prolonged incarceration, the Court granted bail. The conditions imposed are extensive.

Parvez must furnish a personal bond of Rs 2 lakh with two sureties, surrender his passport, remain within the National Capital Territory of Delhi unless granted permission to travel, appear before the trial court whenever required, and report periodically to investigators.

He is prohibited from contacting witnesses, tampering with evidence, making public statements about the merits of the case, or engaging in activities that could prejudice the trial. Among the more notable conditions is a prohibition on uploading, sharing, disseminating or circulating any “anti-national material” through social media or other platforms. The Court also clarified that any violation of the conditions could result in cancellation of bail.

A significant UAPA bail ruling

The judgment arrives at a moment when courts across India are grappling with a growing tension between national-security legislation and constitutional guarantees of liberty. Rather than deciding whether the allegations against Parvez are true or false, the Delhi High Court repeatedly emphasised that such questions must ultimately be resolved at trial.

Its focus was narrower but constitutionally significant: whether an individual can remain imprisoned for years while a trial remains nowhere near completion.

The Court’s answer was clear.

Even in prosecutions involving terrorism allegations, constitutional courts cannot ignore prolonged incarceration. While the allegations against Parvez remain serious and continue to be contested, the Bench concluded that constitutional guarantees of liberty, speedy trial, and due process cannot become casualties of an endlessly delayed prosecution. As the Court put it, Article 21 may, in appropriate cases, “even trump” the restrictions imposed by the UAPA.

The complete judgement may be read below:

Previous reports on the cases against Khurram Parvez may be read here.

Related:

50 HR groups appeal for unconditional release of Khurram Parvez, Irfan Meraj

MEA lashes out against OHCHR comment on Khurram Parvez’s arrest

Kashmir based human rights activist Khurram Parvez arrested

Khurram Parvez is still in jail despite court’s release order due to ‘minor clerical error’

The post Article 21 May Trump UAPA Bail Bar: Delhi High Court grants bail to Kashmiri rights defender Khurram Parvez after 4½ years in jail appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The government presents the exercise as a necessary response to illegal immigration, demographic change and national security concerns. Yet mounting evidence from court proceedings, media investigations, government directives and testimonies from affected families raises a more troubling picture: one in which due process protections appear increasingly fragile, citizenship verification procedures are often opaque, and Bengali-speaking Muslims bear the overwhelming burden of suspicion.

Detailed report may be read here.

At the heart of the controversy, lies a fundamental constitutional question: can the Indian state pursue such detention and immigration enforcement while bypassing the procedural safeguards that protect individuals from arbitrary detention, wrongful deportation and statelessness? Two, without this due process of either established legal norms or procedures not enquiries/investigations into who these illegal immigrants are, is such action not arbitrary and without foundation?

The missing data and the transparency deficit

Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the current deportation drive is not merely the scale of the exercise but the extraordinary lack of transparency surrounding it. Across Assam, West Bengal, Gujarat and other states, governments have announced deportations, detention drives and large-scale verification exercises. Yet even today, there is no publicly available dataset identifying who has been classified as an undocumented migrant, from which districts they were picked up, what evidence was relied upon, whether nationality was independently verified, how many individuals challenged those determinations, how many continue to remain in detention centres, and how many have ultimately been deported.

This absence of information is particularly striking because the consequences of these decisions are so severe. Deportation is among the most coercive powers exercised by the state. It can separate families, extinguish livelihoods, result in prolonged detention and, in some cases, leave individuals stranded in a country they insist is not their own. Yet the public is being asked to accept the legitimacy of the process without access to even the most basic information about how it is being carried out.

The opacity is all the more difficult to justify because the Union governments own deportation policy appears to contemplate extensive record keeping and reporting requirements. The policy submitted by the Ministry of Home Affairs before the Supreme Court requires state governments to maintain records of individuals handed over for deportation, submit mandatory reports to the Union government, and provides that the Bureau of Immigration shall publish information relating to deported Bangladeshi nationals and Rohingyas on a public portal for verification purposes.

Yet little of this information is publicly accessible. Speaking to Al Jazeera, civil rights activist and CJP Secretary Teesta Setalvad argued that the present campaign appears to be driven more by political rhetoric than publicly available evidence. “Even today the authorities have not made available exactly who, which families, from which locations have been identified as illegal immigrants, on what basis and assessment and then sent back,” she said. “There is also an element of targeting specific sections, particular communities.”

Her criticism points to a fundamental problem: In the absence of publicly available data, independent scrutiny becomes nearly impossible. It is impossible to assess whether those being detained and deported are in fact undocumented migrants, whether particular communities are being disproportionately targeted, whether established procedures are being followed, or whether wrongful deportations are taking place.

The demand for transparency is therefore not a procedural technicality. It lies at the heart of democratic accountability. If governments are confident that deportations are being carried out lawfully, after proper verification and in accordance with due process, then there is a compelling public interest in releasing comprehensive data regarding those detained, those housed in holding centres, those whose nationality has been verified, and those who have ultimately been deported.

Until such information is made available, one of the most far-reaching citizenship and deportation exercises in recent Indian history will continue to operate largely beyond meaningful public scrutiny.

From political slogan to state policy

For decades, the BJP has built its political narrative in eastern India around the issue of “illegal infiltration” from Bangladesh. The party has repeatedly argued that large-scale migration has altered the demographic composition of border states, strained public resources and created security vulnerabilities.

The issue has occupied a central place in BJP campaigns in Assam, West Bengal and Tripura. Senior BJP leaders, including Union Home Minister Amit Shah, have frequently described undocumented migrants from Bangladesh as a threat to national security and demographic stability. During previous election campaigns, Shah famously referred to illegal migrants as “termites“, a phrase that drew widespread criticism from civil society groups and human rights organisations. Report in The Hindu.

Following the BJP’s victory in West Bengal, these political commitments quickly evolved into administrative action. Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari announced the implementation of a “detect, delete and deport” framework under which individuals identified as illegal migrants would be detained by state authorities and transferred directly to the Border Security Force (BSF) for deportation, as per Hindustan Times. The announcement was accompanied by instructions to establish holding centres across districts and create a streamlined mechanism for identifying and removing alleged infiltrators. What was once campaign rhetoric had become state policy.

The creation of a national deportation architecture

The developments in West Bengal are not occurring in isolation. According to documents reported by The Hindu, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs has formulated a comprehensive deportation policy requiring states to establish district-level special task forces for the identification, detention and deportation of alleged illegal migrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar. However, before the Supreme Court of India, in the ongoing Rajubala Das v. Union of India case, the deportation policy submitted before the Courts hays down more tested procedures. The same has been explained below.

The policy directs states to:

• Create dedicated holding centres or camps for undocumented migrants awaiting deportation.
• Establish a time-bound mechanism for identification and nationality verification.
• Upload biometric information and demographic data onto the Foreigners Identification Portal.
• Cancel government-issued identity documents obtained by individuals determined to be illegal migrants.
• Maintain monthly reports regarding foreigners who are untraceable, detained or awaiting deportation.
• Coordinate with central agencies to facilitate removals.

The guidelines envision a nationwide infrastructure capable of processing large numbers of suspected migrants. Holding centres are to be enclosed by ten-foot boundary walls and barbed-wire fencing. Detainees are to remain confined pending verification of nationality and completion of deportation procedures.

Although the policy states that these facilities should provide humane living conditions, medical care, educational facilities for children, communication access and recreational space, rights groups argue that the rapid expansion of detention infrastructure signals a shift towards normalising large-scale administrative detention.

A policy contradiction at the heart of the deportation drive

One of the most striking aspects of the current deportation campaign is the apparent tension between the procedures explained above and the deportation framework that the Union Ministry of Home Affairs itself placed on record before the Supreme Court.

In the Rajubala Das v. Union of India proceedings before the Supreme Court, the MHA submitted an affidavit setting out a detailed deportation policy governing the treatment of alleged undocumented Bangladeshi nationals and Rohingyas. That policy envisages a structured process involving coordination between state governments, the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Ministry of External Affairs, foreign missions and designated border-guarding forces. Crucially, it recognises that nationality cannot be assumed unilaterally and that nationality verification is a necessary component of the deportation process.

The policy specifically provides that where an alleged undocumented Bangladeshi national or Rohingya is arrested, their details are to be furnished to the Ministry of External Affairs so that the matter can be taken up with the Bangladesh High Commission or the Myanmar Embassy for nationality verification. The stated purpose is to enable the foreign government concerned to process and verify the individual’s nationality before deportation is carried out.

The same policy also requires state governments to maintain records of all individuals handed over for deportation and submit mandatory monthly reports to the Ministry of Home Affairs. It further provides that the Bureau of Immigration shall publish a list of deported Bangladeshi nationals and Rohingyas on a public portal for verification purposes.

This raises a serious question: If the deportation policy submitted before the Supreme Court contemplates nationality verification through diplomatic channels, maintenance of detailed records, mandatory reporting and publication of deportation data, how do these safeguards square with reports of alleged pushbacks, summary removals and immediate send-backs at the border?

The question becomes even more pressing in light of report that Bangladeshi and Myanmar nationals intercepted at land or maritime borders may be “immediately sent back” after their biometrics are recorded. The apparent gap between the procedures described before the Supreme Court and practices now being reported on the ground deserves far greater public scrutiny.

Detailed report on the Rajubala case may be read here.

Holding centres become operational

The practical implementation of this framework is already underway. Malda became the first district in West Bengal to operationalise a holding centre under the new policy. The facility initially housed nine individuals identified as suspected Bangladeshi nationals, including women and children.

Officials, as per The Indian Express, described the centre as a temporary facility where detainees would remain while their nationality and immigration status were verified.

However, rights advocates point out that detention itself can become punitive when individuals are confined before citizenship disputes are conclusively resolved. This concern is especially significant in border regions where documentation is often incomplete, where migration has historically occurred across fluid borders, and where linguistic and cultural similarities between Indians and Bangladeshis complicate nationality determinations.

West Bengal

West Bengal is the epicentre of the current drive. According to Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, the state has already deported 4,800 alleged undocumented Bangladeshi migrants through newly established holding centres in border districts. Another 836 people were reportedly being held awaiting deportation as of early June 2026, as per The Times of India.

The government has also established an expanding network of detention facilities. Initial reports indicated that 11 holding centres had been created across the state and were housing at least 335 detainees, while later reports from Malda alone suggested more than 150 detainees had already been transferred there from North 24 Parganas district.

Government officials have presented these numbers as evidence of successful enforcement. However, the figures raise significant questions. If nearly 5,000 people have been removed within weeks of the BJP assuming office, it remains unclear how many cases involved completed nationality verification by Bangladesh, how many individuals received access to legal representation, and how many removals were subject to judicial scrutiny.

Gujarat

The largest publicly reported operation outside eastern India occurred in Gujarat. Under “Operation Delta Hunt”, authorities investigated approximately 6,200 individuals and identified 362 people as alleged illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, as per The Hindu. Of these, 166 were identified in Ahmedabad alone, including women and children. Authorities also stated that investigations into hundreds of additional cases were continuing.

The Gujarat government has further indicated that it intends to prosecute employers and landlords accused of sheltering undocumented migrants.

Assam

Unlike West Bengal and Gujarat, the Assam story is not primarily reflected through new numerical announcements but through litigation. Throughout 2025 and 2026, several habeas corpus petitions before the Gauhati High Court and the Supreme Court challenged alleged “pushback” operations involving Bengali-speaking Muslims who claimed Indian citizenship. The significance of Assam lies not merely in the number of people detained but in the emergence of documented allegations that Indian citizens were wrongly identified as foreigners and transported towards the Bangladesh border.

Citizens for Justice and Peace provides legal aid in some cases, details may be read here, here and here.

The Assam cases effectively became the warning sign for what now may happen on a larger scale in West Bengal.

The May 2025 Assam crisis report may be read here.

National figures

At the national level, according to The Hindu, the Ministry of External Affairs has confirmed that India has asked Bangladesh to verify the nationality of more than 2,860 individuals whom Indian authorities believe to be Bangladeshi nationals residing illegally in India.

Simultaneously, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs has directed states to establish district-level mechanisms for the identification, detention and deportation of alleged undocumented migrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar, suggesting that the campaign is being institutionalised nationwide rather than remaining confined to border states.

The human cost of wrongful deportation

Few cases illustrate the dangers of inadequate verification more clearly than that of Sunali Khatun. Reported extensively by BBC News, Khatun, a Bengali-speaking Muslim woman from West Bengal, was detained in Delhi alongside her husband and young son on suspicion of being an undocumented migrant. Authorities alleged that she lacked proof of lawful residence and initiated deportation proceedings. According to her account, officials failed to properly verify her claim that she was an Indian citizen from West Bengal. She, her husband and child were subsequently transported to Bangladesh. Once there, Bangladeshi authorities treated them as illegal entrants and imprisoned them. The family spent months in detention.

Detailed report on this case may be read here.

Only after intervention by the Supreme Court was Sunali permitted to return to India on humanitarian grounds while her citizenship claims continue to be examined. Her husband remains stranded in Bangladesh.  The case exposed the potentially catastrophic consequences of administrative errors in citizenship determination. A mistaken deportation is not simply an immigration decision. It can separate families, result in imprisonment in another country and effectively strip individuals of their nationality.

Due process concerns

The central criticism of the current deportation campaign is not that states lack authority to remove foreign nationals. Every sovereign state possesses the power to regulate immigration and deport individuals who are unlawfully present. The issue instead concerns the process by which such determinations are being made.

Under established principles of administrative fairness and constitutional governance, individuals facing deportation should ordinarily have:

• Notice of the allegations against them.
• Access to documentary evidence.
• An opportunity to challenge adverse findings.
• Legal representation.
• Independent verification of nationality.
• Judicial oversight where fundamental rights are implicated.

The recent practices, however, often fall short of these standards. Reports from Assam and West Bengal suggest that detention frequently precedes verification rather than following it. In several cases, families have alleged that individuals were forced to prove citizenship after already being taken into custody. Such an approach effectively reverses the burden of proof and creates significant risks of wrongful exclusion.

Detailed report on deportation process may be read here.

Religious selectivity and the Citizenship Amendment Act

The controversy is further complicated by the interaction between deportation policy and the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. The CAA provides a pathway to citizenship for Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who entered India before the prescribed cut-off date. Muslims are excluded.

Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari has repeatedly emphasised that communities covered by the CAA will not face action under the deportation framework. Those outside its protection, however, remain vulnerable to detention and deportation. Two individuals entering India under similar circumstances may face radically different legal consequences depending upon their religious identity.

This concern is particularly acute because the overwhelming majority of those targeted by current deportation drives are Bengali-speaking Muslims.

Bangladesh pushes back

The crackdown has also generated significant diplomatic friction. Bangladesh has repeatedly objected to what it describes as attempts by Indian authorities to push individuals across the border without completing formal nationality verification procedures.

As per The Indian Express, Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) officials have publicly stated that they blocked numerous attempts by Indian authorities to send individuals into Bangladesh without prior verification.

Bangladesh’s Foreign Affairs Adviser, Shama Obaid, has stated that Dhaka has repeatedly communicated its concerns to New Delhi and insisted that existing bilateral mechanisms must be followed. The position of Bangladesh is straightforward: no person should be accepted unless their nationality has first been verified. India officially maintains that deportations occur only through established procedures.

Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal has stated that India has submitted details of more than 2,860 suspected Bangladeshi nationals to Dhaka for verification. Yet the persistence of Bangladeshi objections suggests continuing disagreements regarding implementation.

The demography committee

The deportation drive is now being supplemented by a broader effort to study demographic change. The Union Government recently established a high-level committee chaired by retired Supreme Court judge Justice Prakash Prabhakar Naolekar to examine demographic shifts allegedly caused by illegal migration and other factors. The committee’s mandate extends beyond research.

It has been tasked with recommending systems for identifying, detaining and deporting undocumented migrants and proposing mechanisms for strengthening border management and population monitoring. Its creation fulfils a commitment made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and reflects the growing centrality of demographic concerns within government policy.

However, the language surrounding the committee has generated concern. Government statements describe demographic change arising from migration as an “unnatural” phenomenon and a “monumental challenge”. Such framing risks treating entire communities as demographic threats rather than as individuals possessing rights and legal protections.

Detailed report may be read here.

A constitutional test

India unquestionably has the authority to regulate immigration and remove foreign nationals who have entered or remained unlawfully. But citizenship determination is among the most consequential exercises of state power.

A mistaken arrest can be corrected. A mistaken deportation can leave a person stateless, imprisoned in a foreign country or permanently separated from family members. The experiences documented in Assam, the wrongful deportation allegations, Bangladesh’s repeated protests over alleged pushbacks, the establishment of detention infrastructure across West Bengal and the government’s push towards a nationwide deportation architecture collectively point to a deeper concern. The issue is no longer merely immigration enforcement.

It is whether the Indian state can pursue that objective while respecting the constitutional guarantees of fairness, equality and due process. As detention centres multiply, deportations accelerate and citizenship verification becomes increasingly securitised, the challenge confronting India is not simply identifying who belongs. It is ensuring that, in the process of deciding who does not, the state does not abandon the rule of law itself.

Related:

India’s Silent Push-Out: Courts, states, and the deportation of Bengali-Speaking Muslims

Gauhati HC orders clarity after state cites deportation of ‘Wrong Doyjan’ in alleged ‘pushback’ case, demands specific reply on her whereabouts

SC stays deportation of woman declared foreigner, issues notice on challenge to Gauhati HC Order

Contradictory Calls: SC halts one Tamil refugee’s deportation, denies another citing ‘not a Dharamshala’

Gauhati HC directs State to confirm custody or deportation of two men detained in midnight police action in Assam

Assam govt to SC: 33/63 of those marked for ‘deportation’ are contesting ‘foreigner’ status in courts

The post Who decides who belongs? Detention, deportation and the crisis of due process appeared first on SabrangIndia.