New Delhi: The Supreme Court today said that deletion from the electoral roll in the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision will not automatically result in loss of citizenship, almost two months after the apex court directed the commission to forward the names of persons deleted from electoral rolls on grounds of “doubtful citizenship” to the Union government.LiveLaw reported that a bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi, and Justice V Mohana was hearing a petition filed by Prasenjit Bose, seeking various reliefs to streamline the hearing process in the appellate tribunals that have been constituted to hear the appeals of those who have been kept out of the SIR.Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan’s numbers are damning. He said while 34 lakh appeals are still pending in the 19 appellate tribunals in Bengal, the 38,000 appeals which have been decided so far show that at least 70% of them are being allowed back into the rolls. Two judges have resigned from these tribunals so far.While the appeals are pending and have proven to be a long-drawn process, the Bharatiya Janata Party government in Bengal has issued notifications to deny those left out benefits under the public distribution system (PDS), and other welfare measures such as Annapurna Yojana. Sankaranarayanan said that even caste certificates were being denied to those persons.West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari for one has declared that 30 lakh ‘Lakshmir Bhandar’ beneficiaries – the scheme was the previous Trinamool Congress government’s flagship effort – are ineligible under the Annapurna scheme of his new government. His minister Agnimitra Paul had also told The Wire immediately after coming to power that those deleted in the SIR will not get welfare money.Welfare is not the only thing being denied to citizens with the SIR hook in play. R. Rajagopal, former editor of The Telegraph, noted that he had been told that his passport was not being renewed by the authorities because his name had been removed from the electoral rolls.Encountering Sankaranarayanan’s point, the LiveLaw report says, Justice Bagchi said that in terms of the court’s judgement on the Bihar SIR, the Election Commission is not the constitutional authority to decide citizenship. “In our Bihar SIR judgment, we made clear that ECI has a corresponding duty that as soon as there is a decision, it has to refer to the Ministry for adjudication under Citizenship Act. Unless that is done, status must go on,” said Justice Bagchi.Sankaranarayanan noted that the government did not disclose that welfare schemes will be made available to people on the basis of their inclusion in the rolls. “I don’t think that was apprehended by your lordships because then I presume your lordships could add one sentence saying, while it’s being adjudicated, please don’t take other civil rights which are available to citizens,” he said.Seemingly unwilling to do that, Justice Bagchi said, “Our judgment is clear – ECI is not a constitutional authority with regard to status under Art 9, 10, 11 and 12…ECI has control over rolls. It can decide not to include someone. However, that does not result in loss of status of citizenship per se. Therefore, we have given corresponding duty.”The bench re-listed the matter along with the pleas challenging West Bengal SIR.