For anyone who has spent years renting, staring at the same landlord-approved magnolia walls and dreaming of one day adding some actual personality to their home, Pantone's 2026 Colour of the Year might feel like a personal attack. This year, Pantone has chosen white as its colour of the year
‘Mass disenfranchisement’ claims about voter roll revision are without basis, EC tells Supreme Court
The Election Commission told the Supreme Court that there was no basis to allegations that the special intensive revision of electoral rolls would lead to “mass disenfranchisement”, The Hindu reported.
The poll panel said that 95.6% of the voters in Tamil Nadu and 99.7% in West Bengal had already been given pre-filled enumeration forms. Of these, it had already received back 58.7% of the forms and digitised them, it told the court.
It made the statements in affidavits filed in response to petitions challenging the revision of the electoral rolls in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal. A bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi have been hearing petitions against the validity of the exercise.
The court will hear Tamil Nadu's petition on December 4 and that of West Bengal on December 9. At the previous hearing, it had heard Kerala's petition to defer the process. The bench had asked the poll panel to file its response to this by December 1. The matter will be heard on December 2.
In its affidavits responding to the petitions filed by Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, the Election Commission dismissed claims made by the Opposition that there was up to 30% voter exclusion in West Bengal, The Hindu reported.
It said that the statistics on the distribution of pre-filled enumeration forms and the number of completed forms that the poll panel has received back showed that claims by the petitioners about errors, under-inclusiveness and mass disenfranchisement were “highly exaggerated”.
The 1950 Representation of the People Act vested the Election Commission with discretionary powers to conduct a special revision of the electoral rolls “in such a manner as it thinks fit”, the affidavits said.
The poll panel also noted that it had undertaken such an “intensive revision of special nature” of the electoral rolls for all or some parts of the country several times earlier, including in 2002, 2003 and 2004.
Significant changes had occurred in the last 20 years, the affidavits said, including additions and deletions in the electoral rolls on a large scale over a long period, The Hindu reported. Urbanisation and migration had become a regular trend, it added.
The revision exercise is underway in 12 states and Union Territories. Booth-level officers began distributing enumeration forms on November 4.
Besides Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, the voter rolls are being revised in Kerala, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Gujarat, Lakshadweep, Madhya Pradesh, Puducherry, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
A “special revision” of the voter list, which is similar to the usual updates to the electoral roll, will take place in Assam separately.
Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Puducherry and Assam are expected to head for Assembly elections in the first half of 2026.
In Bihar, where the revision was completed ahead of the Assembly polls in November, at least 47 lakh voters were excluded from the final electoral roll published on September 30.
Concerns had been raised after the announcement in Bihar that the exercise could remove eligible voters from the roll. Several petitioners also moved the Supreme Court against it.
On Sunday, the Election Commission extended by one week the timeline for the revision of the electoral rolls in all 12 states and Union Territories.
The last date of submitting the forms was extended to December 11 from December 4. As per the updated schedule, the draft electoral rolls will be published on December 16 instead of December 9.
The final electoral rolls are to be published on February 14 instead of February 7.
Source: Scroll
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For anyone who has spent years renting, staring at the same landlord-approved magnolia walls and dreaming of one day adding some actual personality to their home, Pantone's 2026 Colour of the Year might feel like a personal attack. This year, Pantone has chosen white as its colour of the year
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