After Bihar, EC readies plan for pan-India launch of roll revision

The controversy surrounding the ongoing special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar is expected to rage further as the Election Commission (EC) is learnt to have activated its poll machinery for a potential nationwide rollout of the exercise.

Advertisement

Oppn opposed to SIR

Opposition parties have been demanding that the EC shelve its plan for a nationwide SIR, calling it ‘unconstitutional’. They claim the exercise could disenfranchise about two crore voters out of around 4.9 crore voters registered after 2003 in Bihar.

The move follows the Supreme Court’s recent observation describing the SIR as a “constitutional mandate” and allowing the poll panel to continue the process in Bihar. Several opposition parties and other petitioners had approached the top court, arguing that intensive revision could “disenfranchise eligible voters”.

The development gains added significance amid an ongoing crackdown in various states on illegal foreign migrants, including those from Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Reports said some of the state chief electoral officers had started putting out voters’ list published after the last SIR in their states. The last SIR will serve as the cut-off date for the intensive revision in the state. In Bihar, the 2003 electoral list is being used by the EC for the SIR. Most of  the states have carried out the roll revision between 2002 and 2004. The website of the Delhi Chief Electoral Officer mentions the 2008 voters’ list, referring to the period when the last roll revision had taken place in the national capital. In Uttarakhand, the last SIR was conducted in 2006 and that year’s electoral roll is now on the state CEO’s website.

Though news agencies reported that the pan-India SIR could begin from next month, EC sources told The Tribune that no such date had been fixed yet.

While announcing the revision of electoral rolls in Bihar, where the Assembly elections are scheduled around October-November this year, the EC had said in a statement issued on June 24 that “it had decided to begin the SIR in the entire country”. “As the Assembly elections in Bihar are expected in later part of this year, the Election Commission has decided to conduct the SIR in the state as per the guidelines.... The schedule for the SIR in the rest of the country shall be issued separately in due course,” the poll panel had said.

The Bihar SIR case, which is being heard by a Supreme Court Bench, will now come up for hearing on July 28. Bihar will be going to the polls this year while the Assembly elections in Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal are scheduled in 2026.