Panaji: In a sharp rebuke to Election Commission, Bombay High Court Thursday ordered the restoration of six voters from Goa’s St Cruz constituency whose names were deleted during Special Intensive Revision (SIR) and refused to pause its order so the poll body could rush to Supreme Court.The court gave EC just 10 days to bring the six family members back on the electoral rolls, holding that the right to vote cannot wait for an appeal.“Removal of a name of an elector from the revised roll, especially when they have already submitted Form 8 for shifting of residence within the same constituency and that, too, without affording them any hearing, would amount to denial of the citizen’s right to vote,” the division bench of Justices Valmiki Menezes and Amit Jamsandekar said in their order.Soon after the HC directed the electoral registration officer (ERO) to include their names in the electoral rolls within 10 days, the EC counsel sought a stay of the order for two weeks to approach Supreme Court.“How can there be a stay when we are giving a direction to include the name of a voter?” the bench orally questioned the EC.“We decline to stay the directions given in this order since they pertain to the inclusion of the names of the petitioners as voters in the voting list. Request is rejected,” the HC said in its order.The HC also rejected EC’s argument to keep the matter in abeyance until pending matters before SC dealing with challenges to SIR in various states are decided, saying it “would affect the petitioner’s valuable right to be included in the electoral roll”.The HC said the petitioners have not thrown any challenge to SIR or guidelines issued under SIR and have proceeded on the basis that SIR has been completed in Goa.“The only challenge in this petition is to the order of the ERO rejecting the petitioner’s Form 8 and further challenge to the first appellate and second appellate orders refusing to include the petitioner’s name in the electoral roll for Part 25 of St Cruz constituency,” the HC said.Paresh Salgaonkar and family, who shifted from Part 29 to Part 25 within St Cruz constituency, had rightly filled Form 8 for change of address. The authorities could neither have insisted they fill Form 6 as they are “not new voters”, nor the pre-filled enumeration form as they had already shifted residence and this would have amounted to giving a false declaration, the court said.“We also fail to understand how during SIR, even assuming that the guidelines issued are to an extent to be followed by the EROs, there could be an insistence and freezing of the system, during the period kept for objections to the draft roll, that Form 8 correctly filled by the petitioners, would not be entertained,” the HC said.