West Bengal’s welfare-electoral roll link faces Supreme Court review
The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed petitioners challenging the West Bengal government’s decision to link benefits under the Public Distribution System (PDS) and Annapurna Yojana to the outcome of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls to approach the Calcutta High Court.
Paschim Banga Khet Majoor Samity, an independent trade union representing agricultural labourers, has challenged two notifications issued by the state’s newly elected BJP government. The union argues that the move unconstitutionally ties welfare entitlements to electoral processes.
On June 4, the West Bengal Food and Supplies Department issued an order titled ‘Verification and Deletion of Ineligible PDS Beneficiaries Based on the Outcome of Special Intensive Revision (SIR), 2026 of Electoral Rolls’. The order identifies five categories of ineligible beneficiaries: absentee, shifted, dead, duplicate (ASDD) electors; unmapped cases rejected after hearing; deletions in the second list after draft publication; deletions after adjudication; and electors found ASDD during voter information slip distribution for the 2026 Assembly elections.
The order excludes not only voters deleted during the SIR but also those identified as ASDD during voter slip distribution—a process conducted after SIR, close to polling day. It directs removal of names based on booth-wise lists of deleted electors within a 12-day period ending June 15.
Petitioners argue that the PDS is governed under the National Food Security Act, 2013, which guarantees the right to food. They contend that welfare benefits cannot be denied based on a disability created by a subsequent executive action linked to an electoral process. They cite the Supreme Court’s May 27 judgment on Bihar’s SIR, where the Court held that the Election Commission can conduct limited enquiries into citizenship only for electoral purposes, and such actions do not determine citizenship in the strict sense.
“Such an enquiry does not amount to a determination of citizenship in the strict sense, and any action taken pursuant thereto is confined to electoral consequences alone,” the bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi had stated. The West Bengal government’s order appears to extend the SIR’s ambit to welfare schemes, which petitioners say is unlawful.
Similarly, on May 19, the Department of Women & Child Development and Social Welfare issued an order regarding Annapurna Yojana. It states that existing beneficiaries of the Lakshmir Bhandar Scheme will be migrated to Annapurna Yojana, except those who are dead, shifted, deleted, or absentee electors identified during SIR-2026, or deletions in subsequent lists and ASDD found during voter slip distribution.
Both orders allow beneficiaries who have filed an appeal before the SIR tribunal under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act to continue receiving benefits until their application is disposed of. The SIR process in West Bengal ran from November 4, 2025 to February 2, 2026.
The case highlights the tension between electoral roll cleaning and welfare access, raising questions about the scope of executive actions and the protection of fundamental rights.
