Justice Antonin Scalia repeatedly emphasised that the separation of powers is the Structure’s best safeguard in opposition to tyranny. In his concurring opinion in Morrison v. Olson (1988), he wrote that the Structure doesn’t depend on the great intentions of officers, however on the division of energy amongst branches to forestall abuse. For Scalia, structural separation itself was the “greatest verify on energy.”

Every battle to avoid wasting a slum from demolition leaves an indelible mark of damage on my coronary heart, a wound that festers with the ache of displaced lives and silenced voices. I’ve failed in escaping unscathed from the human toll of those struggles – particularly now that I see a chilling sample. With every large-scale demolition, the state’s rapid goal of quelling dissent is however a veneer for a deeper, extra insidious goal—to inflict a thousand quietly weeping wounds on our democracy. These acts, by stripping residents of their constitutional proper to vote below Article 326 of the Structure, erode the very soul of India’s democratic cloth, abandoning a legacy of disenfranchisement and despair.

Theoretically, grownup suffrage below Article 326 is decoupled from housing standing, making certain each citizen above 18 retains the correct to vote, no matter whether or not he resides in a citadel or in a barrack. A homeless particular person carries the identical proper as a millionaire residing in a mansion – and that’s the essence of equality earlier than the regulation.

Beneath the regulation, a voter is tagged to a constituency for comfort and making logistical preparations for them to vote. The Illustration of the Individuals Act, 1950 (‘RP Act’), below Part 19, requires solely “unusual residence” in a constituency. This take a look at of “unusual residence” is enabled by Article 326 which offers each grownup citizen has a proper to vote if such particular person “is just not in any other case disqualified below this Structure or any regulation made by the suitable Legislature on the bottom of non-residence, unsoundness of thoughts, crime or corrupt or unlawful observe.”

In reality, the Election Fee of India (‘ECI’), in an X (previously Twitter) submit, has clarified that it’s going to additionally embody homeless residents, verified by way of subject inquiries. In observe, nevertheless, this proper is undermined by bureaucratic hurdles and arbitrary voter deletions post-demolitions. The Sales space Degree Officers are slaves to paperwork exhibiting residence.

Part 21 of the RP Act requires annual updates to electoral rolls, whereas Type 7 below the Registration of Electors Guidelines, 1960, governs objections to voter inclusions or deletions, the place the regulation explicitly, in Rule 19, requires a pre decisional listening to and affordable discover to uphold pure justice.

The Delhi Excessive Court docket’s landmark ruling in Sudama Singh v. Authorities of NCT of Delhi (2010) additional strengthened that evictions with out prior rehabilitation violate Article 21’s assure of life and dignity, which encompasses the correct to civic participation. The Delhi City Shelter Board’s 2015 Rehabilitation Coverage requires in situ resettlement and relocation in excessive circumstances.

Nevertheless, the current spate of demolitions present that the Delhi Improvement Authority’s (‘DDA’) most popular mode is demolition with out rehabilitation. Those that are capable of navigate the authorized hurdles might get various lodging to EWS flats in areas far-off from the city centre. Which means voters in a single a part of Delhi will be faraway from the electoral record as soon as their jhuggi is demolished – on the bottom that they’ve shifted their residence.

On this article, I advert to the weaponisation of Type 7 below the Registration of Electors Guidelines, 1960, as enabled by the RP Act. I spotlight that this might be a calculated transfer to deploy the benign electoral framework to disenfranchise the marginalised. Removed from being an administrative instrument for sustaining correct voter rolls, Type 7 — meant for objections to voter inclusions or deletions — has been twisted right into a mechanism for purging the poor from democratic participation. I cite three examples.

Sunder Nursery, Delhi: The Ugliness of Seizing Energy

In November 2023, civic authorities demolished slums close to Sunder Nursery, displacing over 1,000 households below a Delhi Excessive Court docket order citing post-2006 encroachments. This Excessive Court docket order was handed on the idea of Google Maps, projected by the Delhi City Shelter Enchancment Board’s advocate, to argue that the slum was an encroachment that had come up after January 1, 2006. Nevertheless, submit demolition, DUSIB issued a present trigger discover to its lawyer for submitting an affidavit opposite to its directions.

This demolition, which some might argue was deceitful, affected the electoral make-up of the Jangpura constituency. Although many residents from demolished JJ Cluster of Sunder Nursery voted within the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, they have been excluded from the 2025 Delhi Meeting elections.

The misuse of Type 7 below the RP Act, purged 628 voters from the electoral rolls, exploiting their poverty to control a tightly contested election. In January 2025, 628 Sunder Nursery residents have been eliminated with out discover, labeled “shifted” post-demolition, regardless of many remaining in close by camps.

It’s noteworthy that there was a notion that slum dwellers favoured the earlier dispensation. In reality, in an try and woo them, a celebration had tried “Jahan Jhuggi, Wahan Makaan” promise, and doled out DDA’s EWS flats. In constituencies, with shut margins, this exclusion might sway outcomes, as seen in comparable circumstances the place deletions focused migrants and minorities.

Within the context of Bihar’s electoral roll revision, students and legal professionals are discussing the deletion of 65 Lakh names with out following the Type 7 route. Nevertheless, this Type 7, ruled by the Registration of Electors Guidelines, 1960, mandates hearings and 15-day notices for voter deletions – which was not adopted for Sunder Nursery residents. The Supreme Court docket’s Lal Babu Hussein v. Electoral Registration Officer choice (1995) calls for pure justice, however authorities flouted this.

Equally, residents of Madrasi Camp, a part of the Jangpura constituency, confronted comparable betrayal. Pre-election notices issued by the DDA and Public Works Division threatened demolition. But residents, hoping for in-situ housing, voted a method.

Regardless of holding voter IDs and DUSIB tokens proving pre-2006 residency, their houses have been razed post-election, apparently below a Delhi Excessive Court docket order, ignoring the Sudama Singh choice on rehabilitation. The federal government neither challenged this choice within the Excessive Court docket, nor requested the Excessive Court docket even as soon as to rethink its choice. It meekly complied. The restricted resettlements provided by DDA are in Narela, 40 kilometres away from the unique place of habitation.

It’s a matter of report that after purging Sunder Nursery’s 628 voters and threatening Madrasi Camp with demolition, within the 2025 Delhi Meeting election, BJP’s Tarvinder Singh Marwah received by a mere 675 votes in opposition to AAP’s Manish Sisodia. The 628 deletions—exceeding the margin—seemingly swung the end result, proving how demolitions weaponise voter exclusion.

Bulldozer gerrymandering in Assam

Assam has seen hundreds of Bengali talking individuals (together with Muslims) vulnerable to homelessness from evictions in 2023–24, concentrating on Miya Muslims labeled as “encroachers.”

In Dhalpur, between 2021 and 2023, 2,000 households have been evicted; names have been faraway from rolls with out discover, forcing paid re-registrations in new areas. In 2024, Kachutali noticed 1,000 voters obtain deletion notices post-eviction, regardless of makeshift camps in the identical constituency. Authorities cited “shifted” standing, ignoring ECI tips for homeless voters (night time verification with out paperwork) applied elsewhere in India.

In Dhubri, the homes have been demolished on July 8 and on July 15 the intimation of deletion of names from the electoral record have been despatched. Evictions in Goalpara and Nalbarithis 12 months displaced hundreds with out rehabilitation, resulting in fears of citizenship erasure.

The Nalbari evictions illustrate how bulldozer politics successfully nullifies the safety implicit in a grandfather clause. The Assam Accord’s 1971 closing date was meant to safe continuity for settled populations. But households who’ve lived in Bakrikuchi for many years, built-in into the economic system and citizens, are being displaced as “encroachers.”

By demolishing houses, faculties, and mosques, the State severs the evidentiary hyperlink that anchors their residency, leaving them uncovered to voter deletions below Type 7. Language and faith has been made a marker to implement disenfranchisement and subverting Article 326’s assure of common suffrage.

These operations, displacing hundreds of predominantly Bengali-origin Muslim households with out rehabilitation, will not be mere land reclamations however strategic acts of voter suppression and citizenship erasure in polarised areas.

Akbar Nagar, Lucknow: Utilizing city planning for political engineering

In June 2024, the Lucknow Improvement Authority razed 1,800 constructions in Akbar Nagar, displacing 10,000 residents for the Kukrail riverfront mission. Predominantly Muslim, the realm housed long-term settlers with utility payments and voter IDs. The world on the left financial institution fashioned Akbar Nagar and on the correct facet of the ‘drain’ is Shakti Nagar. Whereas Shakti Nagar was regularised as a colony, regardless of being on a flood plain, Akbar Nagar remained as a settlement and by no means regularised.

In view of options provided, the Supreme Court docket upheld the demolitions however mandated rehabilitation below the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (‘PMAY’). But many confronted affordability points (the flats ranged in round ₹4.8 lakh) and insufficient options.

At that stage, what was not thought-about was that the displacement disrupted voter registration, with residents scattered to distant websites like Basant Kunj – reportedly about 12 kms away, complicating tackle proofs for Type 8 updates. Whereas mass deletions are to this point not reported, the chaos mirrors Delhi’s circumstances, probably excluding hundreds in Uttar Pradesh’s 2027 polls.

The demolition of Akbar Nagar has resulted in large-scale pressured displacement inside the constituency, with the inevitable consequence being that each one residents of Akbar Nagar (together with Muslims or these from weak castes) stand successfully disenfranchised. Such dislocation renders their names weak to problem below Type 7 of the RP Act, and it is just a matter of time earlier than an outsider, appearing with malice or political design, secures the wholesale deletion of those voters from the electoral rolls. Expertise from Delhi and Assam reveals that the Election Fee is just too keen to oblige.

This constitutes not merely administrative complicity however a grave assault on the constitutional assure of common grownup suffrage below Article 326, and an impermissible dilution of the correct to equality and non-discrimination below Articles 14 and 15.

Bulldozer demolitions are the brand new gerrymandering, in that they’re meant to displace inconvenient voters particularly these from the poor communities, strip them of ‘unusual residence’, and render them weak to Type 7 deletions.

This two-step exclusion—first eviction, then erasure from rolls—subverts Article 326’s common suffrage and corrodes constitutional morality, weaponising city planning as an electoral instrument.

Scalia’s warning haunts me right this moment. When growth authorities, electoral our bodies, and govt converge, the road between governance and manipulation collapses. What stays is just not democracy, however dictatorship in disguise. Within the title of city planning or city growth, bulldozers are clearing not simply houses, however the very foundations of constitutional morality and common suffrage.

[Talha Abdul Rahman is an advocate-on-record, the Supreme Court of India. Courtesy: The Leaflet, an independent platform for cutting-edge, progressive, legal & political opinion, founded by Indira Jaising and Anand Grover.]