Supreme Court judge Justice Ujjal Bhuyan on Sunday said any process that disenfranchises millions of Indian citizens is “intrinsically arbitrary” and amounts to a negation of the constitutional order. No amount of “whataboutery” can justify such a process, he said.
Speaking at an event at the NALSAR University of Law in Hyderabad, he said the Indian Constitution does not provide for two classes of citizens — one with voting rights and another without them.
Any process that results in the wholesale disenfranchisement of Indian citizens, leaving them without voting rights, would violate Articles 326 and 14 of the Constitution, he said.
“If any process results in disenfranchising millions and millions of Indian citizens, making them second-class citizens in their own country in the sense of being citizens without a voting right, such a process is intrinsically arbitrary. No amount of whataboutery can justify it,” he said.
“Such a process strikes at the very heart of the Constitution. I would go to the extent of saying that it is a negation of the constitutional order that has been adopted under the Constitution of India,” he added.
(With inputs from PTI)
