Mahatma Gandhi championed voting rights for all in 1931: How his plea frames today’s SIR debate

As the country observes Gandhi Jayanti 2026 today, Mahatma Gandhi's viewpoint on voting rights for all is back in focus amid the recent SIR exercise undertaken by the Election Commission of India (ECI). Nearly a century before the latest debate began on who can be or cannot be on voter lists, Gandhi had made a strong pitch for voting rights for everyone.

Writing in his weekly newspaper Young India on October 8, 1931, Gandhi said he could not bear the idea that a man who has got wealth should have the vote, but that a man who has got character but no wealth or literacy should have no vote.

"A man who works honestly by the sweat of his brow day in and day out should not have the vote for the crime of being a poor man, it is an unbearable thing," Gandhi wrote. "I would far rather forego the right of voting myself than that this untouchable brother should not have the vote."

Addressing voter list preparation, Gandhi noted he was not enamoured of the doctrine of literacy or that a voter must have knowledge of the "three Rs" — a pun on reading, writing, and arithmetic.

"I want for my people a knowledge of the three Rs, but I also know that if I have to wait until they have got a knowledge of the three Rs, before they can be qualified for voting, I shall have to wail until the Greek Kalends, and I am not prepared to wait all that time," he declared, referencing the Roman-Greek idiom for a day that never comes.

Recognising the logistical challenges posed by India's massive population, Gandhi conceded, "I know millions of these men are quite capable of voting, but if we are going to give them all the vote it will become very difficult, if not absolutely impossible, to bring them all on the voters' list and have manageable constituencies."

As a solution, he proposed: "We can have this alternative, that he who wants to vote can have the vote... I think a scheme of that character would keep the voters' list in a manageable compass."

Constituent Assembly deliberations of 1947 

About one and a half decades later, when the Constitution for an independent India was being framed, its architect B.R. Ambedkar and other leaders proposed making voting a fundamental right.

However, during deliberations in April 1947, an advisory committee chaired by Sardar Patel rejected the proposal, opting instead for universal adult suffrage — giving every eligible adult the right to vote without discrimination based on race, gender, religion, wealth, or social status.

The issue was subsequently debated multiple times in the Constituent Assembly over the following couple of years.

KF Wilfred, former senior principal secretary at the Election Commission of India (ECI), explained that while making voting a fundamental right was initially proposed in the Constituent Assembly, it was excluded due to the sheer size of India's electorate.

"In principle, we cannot say it should not be a right because it is an important right. But then, considering the size and reasons like one not being able to vote, or someone else voting in someone's name, the entire election process can be impacted," he told PTI.

Exclusions under SIR exercise 

The debate has sharpened dramatically due to the Election Commission's Special Intensive Review (SIR) of voter lists, which has already pushed lakhs of names out of the rolls while leaving many more facing exclusion risks. Experts and political leaders are once again pitching for making voting a fundamental right, or at least ensuring that this right is not snatched from genuine adult citizens.

The issue of making voting a fundamental right has reached courts multiple times. Judges have repeatedly observed that while it may not be a fundamental right, it remains fundamental to India's democracy, with the law treating voting as a statutory right.

Constitutional entitlement vs Legal ambiguity 

PDT Achary, former Secretary General of the Lok Sabha and a distinguished constitutional expert, noted that while the Supreme Court has clarified in a number of cases that voting is a statutory right given under a law, it is fundamentally a constitutional entitlement. On ensuring all eligible citizens can vote, Achary admitted it is a very difficult question in the present situation because things have become complicated with the introduction of SIR.

Achary pointed out that SIR does not find a place in the law, though provisions exist for intensive revision of rolls. Such special revisions were historically confined to specific border constituencies experiencing an unusually large influx of people. He stressed that citizens have started speaking up only after large-scale deletions took place.

"Under Article 326, every citizen of India, unless he is disqualified under some law, is entitled to be registered, that is what the Constitution says. It is not the Election Commission's charity or anything. They are entitled under the Constitution. Constitution gives you this entitlement. That is the thing," Achary told PTI, questioning how the ECI could remove names or place voters under dubious categories such as "logical discrepancies."

Political & Legal battlefront

Referring to the 1947 Constituent Assembly debate, Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh noted the ongoing seven-decade debate over whether the right to vote is a statutory or explicit fundamental right.

"The Supreme Court has itself recognised that voters have a Constitutional and fundamental right to know the criminal antecedents of candidates, their financial interests, and sources of political funding. It has protected ballot secrecy and recognized the right to reject all candidates through NOTA. It is, therefore, all the more anomalous that the right to vote remains only a statutory right," he said. "All surrounding rights have been declared fundamental but the core without which the former cannot exist still remains statutory."

Accusing the government and the Election Commission of acting in a blatant partisan manner, the Congress MP argued that elevating the right to vote to a fundamental right would offer the highest level of judicial review and protection.

"It would be a powerful step in putting in place safeguards against voter suppressions or arbitrary disqualifications that have taken place in different states in astronomical numbers under the SIR process. It would also mean greater Supreme Court vigilance over the functioning of the Election Commission," he added.

(With inputs from PTI)