AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Wednesday said his party had approached the Supreme Court with a petition and a review petition challenging aspects of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, citing concerns over the process and changes to statutory forms.
Speaking to reporters, Owaisi said the petitions were filed through his lawyer, Advocate Nizam Pasha, and included issues arising from different states. He questioned whether decisions taken by the Election Commission had been unanimous or whether any members had expressed dissent.
“We have filed a petition in the Supreme Court through our lawyer, Advocate Nizam Pasha, and we have also filed a review petition. Our purpose in approaching the Supreme Court is that, legally, the Election Commission has to work collectively. It is not clear whether the decisions taken were unanimous or whether there was a dissenting voice,” Owaisi said.
Referring to the Supreme Court's judgment in the Bihar SIR case, in which AIMIM was among the petitioners, he sought clarification on changes made to the enumeration form.
“In the Bihar SIR case, we were petitioners. We do not understand how the statutory form was changed in the enumeration form, and we do not have any material on this. We have included all these issues in a detailed petition before the Honourable Supreme Court,” he said.
On Uttar Pradesh politics, Owaisi said AIMIM was continuing efforts to build an alliance aimed at preventing the BJP from returning to power in the state for a third consecutive term under Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
“We are trying to form an alliance, and even today we are making efforts in that direction so that the BJP government does not return to power in Uttar Pradesh for the third time,” he said.
Asked about the October 2 deadline he had previously set for alliance talks, Owaisi said discussions were still underway and that the party would announce its decision once they concluded.
“We had given October 2 as the deadline, but our discussions are continuing. Once the talks are complete and we reach some conclusion, we will inform you,” he said.
Reacting to Union Home Minister Amit Shah's remarks predicting a worse performance for the Congress in the 2029 Lok Sabha elections and another BJP government, Owaisi said AIMIM would work to prevent the BJP from returning to power.
“We will make every effort to ensure that their government does not come to power in 2029. Our effort has always been to defeat the BJP,” he said.
Owaisi also defended AIMIM's efforts to raise concerns over SIR, saying the party had been working on the issue in Telangana for the past three to three-and-a-half months. He claimed that no other political party in the state had undertaken comparable work on the exercise.
“You are witnesses to the work we have done. For the last three to three-and-a-half months, no political party in Telangana has done as much work on SIR as the AIMIM,” he said.
He added that AIMIM workers had identified alleged shortcomings and raised them with the Chief Electoral Officer and the Election Commission. The party had also worked on the issue in Maharashtra, Delhi and three districts of Uttarakhand, assisting people regardless of their religion or community, he said.
Owaisi said AIMIM had decided to pursue a review petition following the Supreme Court's judgment on SIR while continuing its political opposition to the exercise.
“We are against SIR from the beginning. We are working legally, politically and publicly, and even today we have approached the Supreme Court,” he said.
Maintaining that no single political party could claim exclusive ownership of the issue, Owaisi said AIMIM would continue to oppose the exercise.
“We are a political party. We believe this is wrong, we are speaking against it and we are fighting against it. Nobody is the sole representative of an issue,” he said.