Voter lists shrink by 15.7% in 17 States and U.T.s after SIR

Why in the News

Draft electoral rolls published after the third phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) show the electorate in 17 States and Union Territories falling 15.7 per cent, from 35,50,50,008 at the 2024 Lok Sabha elections to 29,93,00,115. Maharashtra recorded the largest drop in absolute numbers at 15,896,198 electors, or 17.08 per cent, and Delhi and Chandigarh the sharpest percentage falls at 35.89 per cent and 31.84 per cent. The revision rebuilds the roll rather than updating it, so an elector’s presence on the previous roll does not by itself carry them onto the new one. Of the 6.15 crore electors deleted in this phase, 1.11 crore are marked dead, and the remainder are recorded as absent, multiply enrolled or in an others category. The contest is over that remainder, since absence at the moment of verification is not the same thing as ineligibility.

What happened to the rolls between the 2024 polls and the revision?

1. The rolls first grew: Between the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and the cut-off date for the enumeration phase, these States and Union Territories added around 57.75 lakh electors, taking the cumulative total to 36,08,07,394.
2. One State drove most of the addition: Maharashtra added 47.92 lakh electors, and ten other States including Haryana added about 9.83 lakh between them.
3. Six States and Union Territories moved the other way: Delhi’s roll fell from 1,52,14,638 at the polls to 1,45,10,299 before the revision, a drop of more than 7 lakh.
4. The other five declines: Uttarakhand fell by 4.7 lakh, Odisha by 3.17 lakh, Chandigarh by 1.44 lakh, Punjab by 1.1 lakh and Arunachal Pradesh by 10,937.

What are the deletions made of?

1. Death is the smaller share: Of the 6.15 crore electors deleted, 1.11 crore are marked dead, which is the only category that is verifiable against an independent record.
2. Absence is the largest category: 4.52 crore electors are marked absent, meaning the enumerator did not find them at the registered address during the field round.
3. Duplicate registration: 49.58 lakh are recorded as having multiple enrolments, which removes a name from one roll rather than removing the person from the electorate.
4. The residual: Around 3 lakh fall into an others category that the draft does not break down further.

Where does the exercise now stand?

1. The current phase: The third phase covers 16 States and three Union Territories. Draft rolls have been published for 17 of them, with Nagaland due on September 20 and Tripura on October 21.
2. Final rolls begin: The rollout of final lists starts with Mizoram, Sikkim and Manipur on September 6, and the numbers in the final lists can rise, since the Election Commission provides a window for claims and objections and for registration of new voters.
3. Already completed: The revision is over in Bihar, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Puducherry, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Goa, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep.
4. Assam is on a different track: A special revision was conducted there instead, because of legal questions connected to the National Register of Citizens (NRC), the Assam-specific register of citizens prepared under Supreme Court supervision.
5. What remains: With the third phase, the exercise covers the entire country except Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, whose schedule is to be announced later.

Challenges to the Special Intensive Revision

1. The largest deletion category is the least verifiable: An elector recorded as absent may be a migrant worker away for the season rather than a person who has moved permanently. Eg. Out-migration from eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar peaks between sowing and harvest, which is when field verification is conducted.
   The Fix: Accept a claim filed remotely from a declared work address, with the home address retained, before a deletion on grounds of absence is confirmed.
2. The remedy reaches the wrong address: The claims and objections window opens after publication and depends on the elector learning of the deletion, and notices are served at the registered address the elector was not found at. Eg. A household away for work misses both the enumeration visit and the notice that follows it.
   The Fix: Require the booth level officer to record a served notice and one repeat attempt before any absence-based deletion becomes final.
3. The burden of proof inverts: In an intensive revision the existing roll stops being evidence of eligibility, so an elector already enrolled must establish the claim again. Eg. Electors absent from the previous intensive revision roll have had to produce documentary proof of eligibility rather than relying on their existing entry.
   The Fix: Treat the previous roll as presumptive evidence, and require the Electoral Registration Officer to record a specific ground before displacing that presumption.
4. Field capacity is thin at the point where accuracy is decided: A single booth level officer covers a polling station of up to 1,500 electors within a fixed enumeration window. Eg. The verification and the draft publication in this phase ran across 19 States and Union Territories simultaneously.
   The Fix: Publish the per-officer elector load and the number of verification visits made, so the quality of the field round can be audited rather than assumed.

Conclusion

The draft numbers are not the final numbers. The claims and objections window decides whether an elector deleted in absence returns to the roll, and its use depends on people who are away learning that they were removed. A revision that removes duplicate entries and a revision that removes voters produce the same headline figure and are not the same event. The final lists are where the two become distinguishable.

Back2Basics: Special Intensive Revision

1. An intensive revision rebuilds the electoral roll from scratch, enumerating every elector afresh, rather than adding and deleting names at the margin as a summary revision does.
2. It is conducted by the Election Commission of India under the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960.
3. The sequence is fixed: house-to-house enumeration, publication of a draft roll, a window for claims and objections, then publication of the final roll.
4. The last countrywide intensive revision was carried out in 2002-03, and revisions since then have been summary revisions.

Matching Previous Year Question

“Is the right to vote a fundamental right? Discuss the position of the Election Commission of India while undertaking the revision of electoral rolls. Can it also examine the question of citizenship of voters?”