Delhi High Court refuses to entertain PIL against use of village/ward volunteers for preparing electoral rolls in AP

The Delhi High Court on Friday refused to entertain a plea seeking directions to the Election Commission of India (ECI) against utilising the services of village/ward volunteers and village/ward secretariats of Andhra Pradesh for preparing electoral rolls and conducting elections..It was alleged that the volunteers were part of the cadre of the ruling YSR Congress Party.A Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora also rejected the contention that since Andhra CM YS Jagan Mohan Reddy is a party to the dispute, it would be better if a "neutral forum" like Delhi High Court hears the matter..The plea was filed by NGO Citizens for Democracy through its secretary N Ramesh Kumar, a former retired IAS officer and former State Election Commissioner of Andhra Pradesh.It sought action against the Andhra Pradesh government for alleged illegal collection of data of the people of State. It was alleged the State government was using data to add or delete voters in electoral roll..The Court heard the matter and held that the appropriate forum to deal with the PIL would be Andhra Pradesh High Court.It also noted that the petitioner had earlier approached the Supreme Court with the plea and while the apex court had granted liberty to the petitioner to approach the High Court, it was nowhere stated that it should be before the Delhi High Court..In its plea, the organisation argued that the village volunteers have been chosen one person per around 50 households in the entire State of Andhra Pradesh to deliver government services at doorsteps of eligible households.However, it was alleged that most of these volunteers are ruling party’s cadre.It was argued that this village volunteer system is a parallel body to the existing panchayati raj system and is posing a threat to the effective functioning of local self-governance institutions as envisaged under the 73rd Constitutional Amendment.“The Village Volunteers are undertaking functions by interfering with the functions of the constitutionally mandated role of panchayats and are actively interfering into the roles of democratically elected representatives. The act of the Village Volunteer is system trespassing on the existing functions expected of Panchayats in its administrative and financial functions is unconstitutional and requires interference by this Hon’ble Court,” the petition said.It, therefore, sought quashing of the government order appointing these volunteers..On the issue of data privacy, the plea argued that the volunteers/party cadres have been given the additional duty of collecting sensitive date of people in the garb of governmental schemes including issuance of voter identity cards.The data is then being used to add or delete names in the voters list, the petition alleged.“In the name of RTGS (Real-time Governance Society), the State of Andhra Pradesh has created a profiling tool, which is being misused for anti-democratic activity to influence voters and elections… The illegal data collected through the Volunteers are analyzed and made use in elections etc., one example is in the form of deletion of voters from the list. It is perplexing that more than ₹ 68 crores of public money were funneled into these companies, without there being any knowledge of the terms of the contract or the data sharing arrangements,” it was contended. .State of Andhra objected to the maintainability of the plea and said that the High Court of Andhra Pradesh has already dealt with the matter and a Division Bench has upheld the government order.Meanwhile, ECI pointed that the petitioner coming to Delhi High Court and arguing that it is a “neutral forum” amounts to casting aspersions on the High Court of Andhra Pradesh..Senior Advocate Devadatt Kamat appeared for the petitioner.State of Andhra Pradesh was represented through Senior Advocate Rajiv Nayar.Advocate Siddhant Kumar represented the Election Commission of India.