New Delhi, Sept. 27 -- Political tensions over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls intensified on Sunday, with the Congress and CPI(M) questioning the Election Commission's latest measures for voters whose names have been deleted or are at risk of deletion, while the BJP defended the exercise as a necessary clean-up of electoral rolls.
The BJP said more than one crore duplicate entries and 2.8 crore names of deceased voters had been removed from electoral rolls across 31 states and Union territories under the SIR exercise. It accused those who had benefited from what it called "dirty rolls" of now objecting to efforts to clean them up.
The party also said 9.43 crore absent and shifted names had been identified and removed from electoral rolls, describing this as 9.92 per cent of the total electorate on the rolls. In a post on X, the BJP asked who had benefited from keeping duplicate names on the rolls and why the opposition was objecting to the exercise.
BJP spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi said the Election Commission's statement on Saturday made clear that all major decisions, including the SIR, had been taken unanimously by Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi. He accused the Congress of misleading people and questioning the credibility of constitutional institutions.
The BJP's response came a day after the Election Commission announced a series of decisions covering issues that Sandhu and Joshi had raised in internal communications over the previous 10 months. These included changes to voter registration forms, access to electoral-roll databases and the functioning of its IT systems.
The developments followed a report by The Indian Express that Sandhu and Joshi had recorded objections on at least 14 occasions over the 10-month period to decisions and orders, some of which they said had been issued without their knowledge.
The Congress challenged the BJP's figures on deleted voters. Its media and publicity department head Pawan Khera questioned the claim that 2.8 crore of the deleted names belonged to deceased voters. Khera said 13 crore voters had been removed under the SIR and asked what had happened to the remaining 10.2 crore names.
He also questioned whether the BJP's claim indicated that electoral rolls had not been properly maintained for years, asking where the remaining names had gone if they were not deceased voters.
Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh separately attacked the Election Commission's latest measures, calling them "piecemeal" steps that, in the Congress's view, would do little to address what it described as "mass disenfranchisement".
Ramesh said 5.43 crore voters were at risk of deletion and questioned the Commission's proposal for Booth Level Officers (BLOs) to visit their homes again. He argued that such visits were already supposed to have taken place during the house-to-house enumeration phase and alleged that they had been "sparse and sporadic".
For voters already deleted, Ramesh said the Commission's response was to require them to apply afresh to Electoral Registration Officers for inclusion. He questioned the logic of deleting voters and then requiring them to seek re-entry into the rolls.
Ramesh also raised questions about ECINet software, alleging that it had been involved in the deletion of eligible voters and could override Electoral Registration Officers. He said the Commission's proposal to create a committee to certify that the software complies with the relevant Acts and Rules indicated that questions remained over its legality. He also raised concerns about the lack of transparency over the use of artificial intelligence in electoral-roll preparation.
The Congress further alleged that marginalised voters had been targeted for deletion to benefit the BJP and said the Election Commission had not addressed the charge.
The CPI(M) also rejected the Election Commission's statement, saying it had failed to answer serious questions raised by recent disclosures. Its Politburo said concerns raised by opposition parties and civil society organisations over the SIR had been reinforced by disclosures of objections within the Commission itself.
The Left party reiterated its demand for the immediate resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, keeping the dispute firmly centred on both the SIR exercise and the functioning of the Election Commission.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.