The Supreme Court recently refused to entertain a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking the declaration of voting rights as part of fundamental rights.
Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud stressed the necessity for a live controversy to be present before the top court, adding that the need for a legal dispute to warrant jurisdiction under Article 32.
Though the counsel claimed of an imminent threat to voting rights in India. The Chief Justice remarked that they did not find evidence of any such live issue that would justify the court’s intervention under Article 32.
Furthermore, it was observed that the apex court did not find the existence of any such live issue which warrants the jurisdiction under Article 32. Therefore, the Supreme Court proceeded to dismiss the plea without expressing its merits.
The advocate appearing for the petitioner pointed out examples from countries like the USA and the UK, where rogue organizations posed threats to democracy in the past. However, seemingly disinclined to entertain the matter further, the bench dismissed the plea without expressing any opinion on its merits.
Last year, a bench of Justice S Ravindra Bhat and Justice Aravind Kumar while dealing with an election petition case underlined that the importance of the right to vote and a constitutional provision enabling every eligible citizen to exercise common suffrage.
During the hearing in the aforesaid matter, the top court has called it paradoxical that the right to vote is not assigned the status of a fundamental right while democracy has been recognised as a basic feature of the Indian Constitution.
The bench said that democracy has been held to be a part of one of the essential features of the Constitution. Yet, somewhat paradoxically, the right to vote has not been recognised as a fundamental right; it was termed as a mere statutory right, the bench added.