Telangana High Court seeks ECI’s response over enumeration forms being issued only in Telugu

The Telangana High Court on Thursday posted to Monday the hearing of a writ petition seeking a direction to declare the Election Commission of India’s action of printing and distribution of enumeration forms during Special Intensive Revision only in Telugu as illegal and arbitrary. 

Justice Pulla Karthik of the HC, who heard the contentions of the petitioner’s counsel Raghunath Verose, sought to know ECI’s response from its standing counsel Avinash Desai over the enumeration forms being distributed only in Telugu in the State. Senior counsel Raghunath, presenting his arguments, said Telangana was home to people speaking different languages like Urdu, Hindi, Telugu and English. 

Usage of enumeration forms printed only in Telugu appeared to be an attempt to delete votes of minorities speaking languages other than Telugu, the senior advocate argued. The SIR-2026 of the electoral rolls in Telangana commenced from Wednesday (June 24). Persons like migrant workers would not be able to comprehend the points mentioned in Telugu enumeration forms, he said. 

Also, persons whose mother tongue was not Telugu would also have difficulties in filling up the forms. Such language barriers might result in mistakes, omissions, delays and in some instances it would cause exclusion of from the electoral revision process, the advocate said. 

During the previous SIR undertaken in 2002, large number of mistakes cropped up in electoral rolls with regard to names of the voters due to entry of incorrect data by the computer operators, the senior counsel said. He wanted the HC to direct the ECI to ensure the enumeration forms were issued in a bilingual format (Telugu and English). 

The ECI standing counsel informed the bench that it was decided to distribute enumeration forms in English in Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation area while in the districts Telugu forms were being distributed. The petitioner’s counsel said some people in Telangana, who are not well versed in Telugu, would miss out on important details during SIR if the forms were only in Telugu. 

Agreeing with the contentions of advocate Raghunath, the judge said some persons may not be able to understand enumeration forms in Telugu and sought to know how the ECI would justify the matter. The ECI standing counsel said that during similar exercises in other States the enumeration forms were printed in local language. He said English, Telugu and Urdu versions of the forms were available online and the same can be downloaded. 

However, advocate Raghunath said the forms in English and Urdu should be given to voters as a matter of right and they cannot be at the mercy of the booth level officers. Finally, the hearing was posted to Monday, after the ECI standing counsel sought time to secure instructions on the matter.