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Pan-India SIR: Why EC Is Ditching Routine Revision For A Nationwide Voter Roll Clean-Up
Pan-India SIR: Why EC Is Ditching Routine Revision For A Nationwide Voter Roll Clean-Up
The Election Commission of India (ECI) is moving towards the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in a staged manner across the country from next month to address concerns raised against the purity of the voter list, News18 has learnt.
A poll body official said with elections to five assemblies—West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Kerala and Puducherry—scheduled in the initial few months of the upcoming year, the poll body wants to hold the SIR instead of the regular Special Summary Revision (SSR).
The elections for these assemblies were held between March and April in 2021 and the results were declared on May 2. The election in 2026 will have to be completed by May.
The poll body plans to announce the SIR timeline on Monday, covering around 10 states, including the five assemblies listed. The announcement of pan-India SIR was done by the ECI in June this year.
SIR is an intensive revision of electoral rolls through house-to-house enumeration for an almost clean voter list. Each and every house is visited by the poll body officials to record eligible electors as of a qualifying date.
By replacing the routine SSR with a door-to-door SIR, the EC aims to deliver a more accurate and credible voter roll nationwide.
SSR: A Look at 2025 Timeline
It is important to note that the final 2025 electoral roll after the SSR was released on January 6, 2025, and the revision process had started in August 2024.
The draft was released on October 29, 2024, with November 28, 2024, set as the final date for filling claims and objections.
The ECI, under the leadership of former CEC Rajiv Kumar, had said the commission has decided to carry out Annual Summary Revision in such a manner that the electoral rolls are finally published much before National Voters' Day on January 25, 2025.
This was done so that EPICs generated for new electors, especially young voters, can be distributed to them in a ceremonial manner on National Voters' Day.
SIR: Tentative Timeline
The poll body is expected to focus on these five assemblies for the SIR drive in the first phase.
Expected from November 1, the draft for these states and Union Territories is likely to be issued by the first week of December and the final roll by January-end. The month of December will be for claims and objections, the poll body official said
Why SIR and not SSR?
The answer of why the poll body has decided to hold only the SIR and not the annual SSR lies in the questions raised by the purity of electoral roll across states in India.
“The ECI cannot compromise with the purity of the electoral roll. Just like in Bihar, the last SIR in most Indian states was done in the early 2000s. A lot of factors have made it critical for the ECI to hold the SIR. In addition, the credibility of the ECI has increased after the success of the SIR in Bihar. The political parties, despite the allegations, hardly came up with claims and objections," the official told News18.
Even as a case against the SIR is underway in the Supreme Court, and the next hearing is on November 4, the poll body's decision to hold SIR and not SSR also has roots in the questions raised during Bihar SIR that why the SSR was conducted in January and not the SIR.
“The CEC (Gyanesh Kumar) took charge only in February so the January SSR timeline could not have been altered then," they added.
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Amid the Opposition raising questions against the purity of voter rolls across several parts of the country, an intensive door-to-door cross checking of voters may give some additional trust to the ECI.
With Opposition concerns over voter roll purity still lingering, Monday's announcement could signal the ECI's commitment to a transparent, door-to-door verification across the country.
Source: News18
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