SC rejects ADR plea to get permit access to voters list in machine-readable voters list
Might compromise voters' privacy, says bench
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New Delhi: The Supreme Court has orally refused to permit making the machine-readable voters list available, clarifying that this might compromise the voters’ privacy.
The SC bench of Justices Surya Kant and Bagchi, heard on Tuesday the petitions challenging the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls, which will be held by the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) in Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Pondicherry and West Bengal, among other states, according to a report by LiveLaw.
The judges said that, as the Election Commission of India (ECI) held the voters’ data in trust, it had the right to adopt methods to ensure the data remained protected. The judges, however, directed the ECI to find password-protection techniques that give easy access to an individual but prevent unauthorized access.
Senior advocate Prashant Bhushan, who represented the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), said that the NGO had filed an interlocutory application seeking a direction to the ECI to provide the 2002 voters list in machine-readable format to help voters confirm if their parents’ names are included.
The lawyer also said that no prejudice would be caused if the ECI made the data available in searchable form.
Justice Bagchi, however, expressed privacy concerns regarding sharing of voters’ data in the format and, referring to an earlier case, said that electoral rolls need not be furnished in machine-readable format.
The judge said that, as it was a matter of privacy and data protection, making the machine-readable format could open doors to ‘data mining’ by third parties. Also, he said that the suggestion may be deliberated upon by the parties.
"Let's get the ECI's response on what kind of dangers it can pose", said Justice Kant.
"A prejudice is [per se]... data available at large for mining, irrespective of individuals, any agent... have to take into consideration the issues of individual privacy, collective protection of data of Indian citizens. This is not adversarial. It has a polycentric impact. Independent of the rights of a person who is seeking to vote, the data itself is a valuable asset. That the ECI is holding in trust. What you may suggest, and the ECI may consider, that the individual may have a password to access the data. That's how the individual can verify his data from the encrypted database of ECI. The data is valuable asset entrusted to the ECI. So ECI is entitled to have layers of privacy on the data", Justice Bagchi stated.
On Bhushan mentioning ADR's application seeking inter-alia electoral roll data in machine-readable form, the bench issued notice for the ECI to respond. The judges found "good" a suggestion made by ADR that de-duplication software available with ECI be used to tackle multiple entries of one individual in the rolls.
The Court sought the ECI's response to the application and posted the matter to November 26.
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HC quashes order staying proceedings against Anil Ambani to classify his bank accounts as fraud
Mumbai (PTI): In a setback to industrialist Anil Ambani, the Bombay High Court on Monday quashed a single bench interim order that stayed proceedings initiated against him and Reliance Communications Ltd to classify their bank accounts as fraud.
A division bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad allowed the appeals filed by three public sector banks and auditor firm BDO India LLP against the December 2025 interim order passed by a single bench of the HC.
The division bench, while quashing the single bench order, termed it "illegal and perverse".
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Ambani's counsels sought the HC to stay its order so that they could approach the Supreme Court, but the request was declined.
The banks last month challenged a December 2025 single-bench order granting interim relief to Ambani and his company. The order had cited violations of mandatory RBI rules and a classic case of banks "waking up from deep slumber" after years.
The single bench order stayed all present and future action by Indian Overseas Bank, IDBI Bank and Bank of Baroda, noting that the action was based on a legally flawed forensic audit and violated the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) mandatory guidelines.
The three banks in their appeal said the forensic audit, which led to accounts being classified as "fraud", was legally valid and based on serious findings of fund siphoning and misutilisation.
This was recorded in the report submitted by the audit firm BDO LLP, they contended.
The banks, in their plea, also said Ambani had raised a technical challenge to the forensic audit before the single bench.
They sought the division bench to quash the single bench's interim order, claiming it was "perverse".
Ambani had challenged before the single bench show-cause notices issued by the Indian Overseas Bank, IDBI and Bank of Baroda, seeking to declare his and Reliance Communications' accounts as fraud accounts.
As an interim relief, he sought a stay of the notices and an injunction against any coercive action on the ground that BDO LLP was not qualified to conduct the forensic audit as its signatory was not a chartered accountant.
BDO LLP was an accounting consultant firm and not an audit firm, Ambani claimed.
The single bench had agreed with Ambani and stayed the action by the banks.
