EC Kicks Off Nationwide Voter List Cleanup; Gujarat, Bengal, TN Among 12 States In Phase 1
The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Monday officially announced a pan-India Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, a massive exercise aimed at purifying voter lists for the first time in over two decades. The first phase of the cleanup will cover 12 states and union territories, including election-bound West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, as well as Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh.Addressing a press conference, Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar confirmed that the nationwide rollout follows the “successful” completion of the controversial SIR in Bihar.
He explained that a new revision was necessary as the last one was conducted 21 years ago, between 2001 and 2004. Over the years, issues like frequent migration, duplicate voter IDs, wrongful inclusion of foreigners, and the non-removal of deceased voters have crept into the electoral rolls. “Hence, ECI decided to conduct step-wise SIR across the country,” the CEC said.The process will begin immediately, with the voter lists in the 12 selected states and UTs being frozen as of midnight on Monday. Booth Level Officers (BLOs) will then undertake the massive task of visiting every house three times to verify electors.
A key part of the process involves linking current voters with their names or their relatives’ names in the last SIR records from 2002-2004 to establish legacy. The poll body also stated that polling stations will be rationalized to ensure no station has more than 1,200 voters.The SIR’s primary objective is to identify and remove illegal immigrant voters, along with duplicate and other ineligible entries. This model was first tested in Bihar ahead of its assembly elections, where it led to the removal of 42 lakh names from the final roll.
The exercise in Bihar was fiercely contested by opposition parties, who termed it an attempt at “vote theft” and took the matter to the Supreme Court. While the top court issued several directives, it ultimately upheld the ECI’s authority to conduct the revision.The first phase of the national rollout will include states with upcoming assembly elections in 2026, such as Assam, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, and West Bengal, making the exercise politically significant. The ECI will defer the revision in states where local body polls are currently underway.
