Former Calcutta High Court Chief Justice T. S. Sivagnanam, appointed as one of 19 retired judges serving as single-member Appellate Tribunals for Special Intensive Revision in West Bengal, resigned from his tribunal position on Thursday citing personal reasons.
Former Calcutta High Court Chief Justice T. S. Sivagnanam, one of the 19 retired judges appointed as single-member Appellate Tribunals to hear appeals under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in West Bengal, resigned from his tribunal post on Thursday.
His resignation comes after an intense 23-day schedule in which he cleared 1,777 appeals without rejecting a single one. He said that at the current pace, it would take at least four years to finish hearing all pending appeals from Kolkata.
The Supreme Court had directed Justice Sivagnanam to conduct special, out-of-turn hearings for appeals filed by Suprabuddha Sen, the grandson of artist Nandalal Bose, and by Congress candidate Motab Shaikh, who later won the election from the Farakka Assembly seat.
The apex court had specifically ordered expedited hearings for some appellants, including Shaikh and Sen.
The appeals were placed before Justice Sivagnanam, who accepted them.
Justice Sivagnanam had completed a two-year tenure as Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court in September last year. He was among the 19 former judges recommended by Calcutta High Court Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and formally notified by the Election Commission on March 20 for appointment as single-member Appellate Tribunals.
Justice Sivagnanam, sources said, sent his resignation to Chief Justice Paul on Thursday. The Election Commission of India and the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal were also informed.
In an unprecedented move, the Supreme Court on February 20 ordered judicial officers at the rank of district judge and additional district judge to determine the eligibility of lakhs of electors in Bengal.
The court observed that there was a “trust deficit” between the state government and the Election Commission.
A total of 60.06 lakh electors were placed under adjudication by the Election Commission. After adjudication by 700 judicial officers, 27.16 lakh electors were removed from the voter rolls.
Justice Sivagnanam submitted his resignation to Calcutta High Court Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and also sent a copy to the Election Commission.
Speaking before leaving for Chennai, Justice Sivagnanam said,
“I cleared 1,777 appeals between April 5 and 27. I even heard the appeals of Suprabuddha Sen, the grandson of eminent painter Nandalal Bose, and his wife Deepa Sen and restored their voting rights. I approached the appeals with an open mind. Later, I verified the appeals from Kolkata South and Kolkata North.”
Justice Sivagnanam worked every day from 8.30 am to 5 pm, and he also heard cases on Sundays to ensure faster disposal. He said he personally travelled and conducted hearings outdoors whenever needed.
He recalled instances where he heard the complaints of extremely poor voters, saying,
“I heard the appeals of the very poor under a tree on the road and also 30 or more of them wrote ‘headache’ as their occupation. I realized that it would take another four years to comprehensively address these appeals for Kolkata.”
He also pointed out several administrative and documentation problems during the process.
He said,
“There are still blank forms. I also saw other problems where the writing was so clear that I had no option but to give justice. In some cases, the court restricted me to 30 words, but I tried giving orders in four to five lines to accommodate this.”
With his resignation, the SIR appeal process in Kolkata faces uncertainty, especially because Justice Sivagnanam was handling the highest load of transferred appeals from multiple districts. His departure is expected to slow down the scrutiny of voter roll disputes ahead of the crucial electoral season.
Earlier, On March 10, the Supreme Court ordered the creation of an appellate mechanism. While the court was hearing challenges to the SIR in Bengal, it noted on April 13 that more than 34 lakh appeals relating to both exclusions and inclusions had been filed.
Subsequently, the court ordered that all appeals approved by the tribunals up to two days before voting in Bengal April 21 for the first phase and April 27 for the second could be restored to the rolls, allowing those electors to vote. However, fewer than 2,000 such appeals were approved before the deadlines.
The remaining 27.16 lakh electors who had been deleted during adjudication were therefore unable to cast their votes in this election.
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