The Supreme Court, during a hearing in the Bihar Special Intensive Revision (SIR) case on Tuesday, said that Aadhaar cards and Electoral Photo Identity Cards (EPIC) are not proof of citizenship. A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi is hearing the case.

During the arguments, Kapil Sibal, who appeared on behalf of the petitioners, said: “Aadhaar, ration, and EPIC cards not being accepted.” “They [Block Level Officers] are not accepting Aadhaar; if I say I’m a citizen of India, the burden is on them [to prove it] – but none of this has happened. It states that only information is to be provided. Sibal referred to Rule 13 of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, which says every objection to a proposed inclusion of a name shall be in Form 7 and made by some person whose name is in the roll,” he was quoted by legal news media website Live Law.

Justice Kant, however, said: “They’re right in saying they can’t be accepted as conclusive proof.”

Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who, too, is appearing on behalf of the petitioners, said: “: Electoral roll is presumptively held not to be valid solely on the ground of citizenship. You cannot have a system where citizenship is doubted for 5 crore people.” “Those [already] on the rolls can’t be dealt with a negative presumption. This case deserves interim intervention,” he added when the SC said the entire exercise can be set aside even if its illegality is established as late as September.

Singhvi further alleged that in putting the onus of proving citizenship entirely on the voters, the government had reversed the system of revising the rolls. “In the guise of revising, they’re doing an exercise reversing the burden of proving citizenship.”

He also pointed out that the summary revision of rolls, which was conducted 8-10 months ago, took 2.5 months. Hence, just 1 month can’t be enough for 5 crore people.”