Hyderabad, Oct 4 (PTI) Supreme Court judge Justice Ujjal Bhuyan on Sunday said any process which disenfranchises millions of Indian citizens was intrinsically arbitrary and a negation of the constitutional order. No amount of “whataboutery” can justify it.
Speaking at an event at the NALSAR University of Law here, he said the Indian Constitution does not provide for two classes of citizens — one class of citizens with voting rights and the other class of citizens without voting rights.
Any process which leads to wholesale disenfranchisement of Indian citizens making them citizens without voting rights would be violative of Articles 326 and 14 of the Constitution of India, 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 and he would go to the extent of saying that it is a negation of the Constitutional order which has been adopted based under the Constitution of India,” he added. PTI
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