A National Convention on Defending Universal Adult Franchise, convened by Bharat Jodo Abhiyan, the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) and the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM), took place at the Constitution Club, New Delhi, on 20 December, 2025. At this National Convention, the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls being carried out by the Election Commission of India in different states of India was discussed. About two hundred persons, including many witnesses, attended the Convention and were part of the audience. We post below the report of the jury

 Conclusion of the jury:

After hearing the testimonies, the jury is of the view that the revision of electoral rolls is being carried out hastily and sometimes carelessly. The possibility of mass disenfranchisement is, therefore, real and ominous. It is imperative for the process to be fair and accurate; all eligible voters must be duly registered and should be able to exercise their right to vote. To fulfil these basic requirements, the SIR process needs to be reconsidered and reworked, and until that is done, in the interim, it must be stopped.

Jury members:  Justice Madan Lokur (Retd.), Justice A.K. Patnaik (Retd.), Ms. Pamela Philipose, Dr. Jean Drèze, Prof. Nivedita Menon (Retd.)

Report of the jury

At the National Convention, we as members of the jury heard persons from Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Goa and Uttar Pradesh on how the SIR of electoral rolls conducted by the Election Commission through the Booth Level Officers (BLOs), was impacting them.

This report is in three parts – Testimonies, Findings and Conclusion

Testimonies

The testimonies are summarized below:

1. Share croppers Dharamchand and his team are from Kotra tehsil Udaipur district, which also borders Sabarkantha, Banaskantha district of Gujarat. He said that as their village existed much before the state boundaries were determined, 10-12 houses of their village are in Gujarat. There is large scale migration of families from their village for share-cropping in Gujarat. This migration is almost for the entire year. From Kotra region, approximately 15000 voters leave for Gujarat for agriculture employment. The SIR process took place in peak agricultural season, and the Gujarat farmers did not allow these sharecroppers to return to fill the forms. From their block, in total, more than 23000 names have been excluded from Draft Rolls; the reason given for most is “absent” and “shifted”. But no one cares to follow up where they have shifted and their names are just deleted. Women have been disproportionately excluded. Many of these women were born in Gujarat. It is difficult for them to bring documents from their natal homes, and in-laws are not accepted by ECI as “relatives”.
2. In Nalti hamlet, in Badhwani, Madhya Pradesh, most adults had left for agricultural labour in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnataka and about 15-16 houses were locked during the SIR process. Many migrant workers did not have phones and they could not be informed of the SIR process. Consequently, their names were deleted from the draft electoral rolls. (Testimony of Nasri Bai in Nemadi language translated for the jury)
3. In southern districts of the Bastar region in Chhattisgarh, due to earlier Salwa Judum actions, about 644 villages were destroyed and 3 Lakh people were displaced. As many houses were burnt, several people have no documents. The BLOs have seldom visited these areas, and the voters’ lists have been inaccurate for the last 25 years. Many of the displaced people have migrated to Odisha, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana. It is feared that around 1.25-1.5 lakh voters will be removed from the draft electoral rolls. (Testimony of Manish Kunjam, former MLA Konta, Bastar).
4. Vishwaratna Sinha from Bhilai testified that the BLO sent off whatever forms he had before some people could get their documents together. There was confusion about what kinds of photographs were acceptable and by the time they could figure this out, the forms had been submitted by the BLO before the last date.  When they visited the BLO, he is said to have told them that BLOs are under great pressure and must complete this process quickly. He reportedly said, “It is too late for your forms now, you can raise a challenge later”. Only when they went to the Collector who contacted the BLO, did the BLO accept these forms although they were within the last date. Mr Sinha made the point that misinformation and confusion are rife and if people who had access to the Collector were made to run around so much, one can imagine what is happening to the mass of ordinary people. Also, he said the survey was carried out here in the harvest month of November in a region where 80 percent of the population is engaged in some kind of agriculture related work.
5. In Umaria village, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, there are about 150 voters of a nomadic tribe identified as belonging to the ghumakkad jati. They have been labelled as Rohingya/Bangladeshi and are facing the threat of their names being deleted from the electoral rolls under the SIR process, even though they possess documentary evidence to show that their fathers and forefathers have been included in the electoral rolls since 1984. Many have voted regularly since 2008 but only one of the community is on the 2002 Voter List. The tribe has a long history of displacement and migration. (Testimony of Mohd. Mehdi, Bablu Khan and Sabeen Khan).
6. Jaipur, Rajasthan – Madaris who have lived for generations in Rajasthan, are nomadic people who perform in different villages. They cannot give permanent addresses nor are they able to get caste certificates. Some have voted before, some of them are on the 2002 list, and yet after Pulwama, many of them were branded Pakistani by police and picked up to be deported out of the state they have lived in all their lives. It was with great difficulty that they managed to convince the authorities and get their men out of jail. They added that most of them had got notices to produce documents showing their 2002 status, but most cannot match to 2002 Electoral Rolls, since their parents had no cards in 2002. They were asked to fill Form 6, but the new version of Form 6 in the SIR states has a section asking for the 2002 entries of their parents/relatives. For those above 40 years, the BLOs refused to accept their Form 6, questioning how was it possible that they were new voters. They were told to make Mul Niwas certificates which was most difficult as no Gazetted Officer would sign their document. Authorities refused to accept their age even on affidavit. Despite the 2013 order for homeless people, where the BLO is required to spend two nights in a basti to assess whether the person actually stayed there to establish residence, the officials refuse to accept any address proof. (Testimony of Alijan, Abid, Dharamvir, Sajid, Anwar).
7.  Ranjit from Araria, Bihar – In his village, the BLO filled forms on his own and submitted them without consultation. He would not add the names of those women who had married into the village and could not provide details of their parents living in their natal villages. Ranjit’s own name as well as many others were reported as “dead”, including the name of a serving government servant. It took a lot of running around to get these names back on the list as people who were alive.
8.  In Ahmedabad, Akbar Nagar, Vidhan Sabha Constituency No. 50, Booth No. 173, a settlement of Muslims (which had been rebuilt after destruction in the 2002 riots), was demolished 11 months ago. The High Court ordered rehabilitation of the people in the basti and this order was partly followed. After SIR started, the voters got forms which were filed online but their names were not accepted. When they approached the BLO, he assured them that the anomaly would be corrected, but after a few days he said that he had been ordered not to accept these forms because their basti  has been officially demolished. The Electoral Registration Officer informed them that he has received a letter from the sitting BJP MLA of Bapu Nagar, that these people are living in the area illegally and that their forms should be rejected. In the draft electoral rolls released on 19.12.2025, all these 1206 persons have been excluded and listed as “Dead”. (Testimony of Ikram Beg Mirza, Akhtar Khan, Mohd Irfan Ansari and Irfan Sheikh).
9.  In Kalyanpur, Harshad village in Dwarka, Gujarat, fisherpeople have been living along the coast for over 50 years. Three villages were declared as encroachments and demolished. Of these, the names of inhabitants from two whole villages were deleted from the list, despite the fact that their names were in the 2002 list. Chandola, the third demolished village was not affected in terms of inclusion in the voters’ list, and in fact a camp was set up for voters here to ensure enrolment in the electoral rolls. It is speculated by the villagers that this discrimination is because the other two villages challenged demolition of their villages in the High Court. So their names were deleted as a kind of punishment. All three demolished villages are Muslim villages.  (Testimony of Mujahid and Santosh).
10.  In Bihar‘s Fulwari assembly constituency, the name of Jeetni Devi has been deleted from the final electoral roll pursuant to SIR of 2025, on the ground that she is dead, although she is alive. Because of such deletion of her name from the final electoral roll, her old age pension has been stopped and now she does not have any money to buy medicines. She has an Aadhaar card but it is now of no use (online testimony of Jeetni Devi).
11.  Tamil Nadu – the ECI did not issue any advertisement regarding the SIR. BLOs were not properly trained. The high proportion of deletions from metro areas – Chennai and Coimbatore – is related to large-scale slum clearance in these cities in the last 10 years. These people continue to live in the same city but received no enumeration form and yet have been excluded. The other large-scale exclusion is those tribals in Mudumalai forest area who have been displaced by a government project. A PUCL team visited displaced tribals in Kurum forest in Mudumalai forest. These tribals are now living in three different pockets. One pocket received the Enumeration Forms two days before the last date. No one came to collect the forms back. The other two pockets received no Enumeration form and hence all these tribals have been excluded. (Online testimony of Balamurugan, PUCL)
12.  In Akbar Nagar Basti, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, there were 12,000 to 15,000 persons living, 90% of whom were Muslims. In order to establish a zoo and a lion safari in the area , the basti had been demolished and the people in the basti had to be rehabilitated pursuant to the orders passed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court. During SIR, no enumeration forms were given to the people from the area as the Akbar Nagar area no longer existed. The place where they have been rehabilitated – Vasant Kunj – has not been included in any constituency yet. PUCL went to the CEO, but the CEO said, we’ll add them through Form 6 after the SIR process is over. They protested that they are not new voters but already existing ones. The BLO replied that may be true, but Akbar Nagar no longer exists. So, in a way, they have been already eliminated on paper. As a result, voters who had once lived in Akbar Nagar were excluded from the draft electoral rolls. Large scale demolitions by the government of UP has affected almost exclusively Muslims, and having lost their home and addresses, they no longer exist in any official records. At the same time, it was testified that a two week extension was given to sadhus to be enumerated, and special camps were set up for them. Another excluded category is transgender people who have been forced to leave their families due to being disowned by them, and are not in a position to produce any documents to establish who their parents are or their permanent addresses. (Testimony of Arundhati Dhuru, Uttar Pradesh, NAPM)
13.  In Madhya Pradesh in Nagda, Munna Khan of Polling Booth no. 81, Vidhan Sabha No. 173, Jabran Colony, Kilkipura Nagda, has an EPIC number – MP/38/263/228508. When this was searched for in the 2003 list, this particular EPIC number appeared against the name of Reshma, Sr. No. 413. Reshma is a neighbour. Munna Khan has a son and three daughters from his wife who has passed away. As his name is not in the 2003 list, the children too cannot link themselves to the 2003 list. (Testimony of Renuka, BJA)
14.  In Goa, the SIR process was conducted in the middle of the Christmas season when a significant section of the population caught up in the festive period was unable to follow up on the deletions of their names (online testimony of Albertina Almeida).
15.  Assam – Ajit Bhuyan MP (Independent) stated that it has been openly declared by the ruling party that even someone who has lived in the state for a few days can vote. Through CAA, many new voters have been enrolled. Pending cases against Hindus in FRRO have been withdrawn to enable them to be enrolled through SIR.
16.  Gajanand, father of BLO Mukesh Chand Jangir who had committed suicide during the process testified that Mukesh was a hard-working, responsible BLO. Yet, he was put under tremendous pressure by his supervisor, and was threatened that he would be removed from his job if he did not meet the (form digitization) targets. And it turns out that there was no need for this pressure, as eventually the government itself extended the date for the submission of forms. It was stated that the family’s attempt to file an FIR failed, as it was not accepted. Gajanand said that their family has not received any support from the government nor any compensation.

Findings

It is clear from these testimonies of representatives from several states across the country that:

1. The SIR process in different states has been hastily and haphazardly conducted, without carefully following the provision of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960.
2. A large number of agricultural labourers, particularly from the states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, who were absent from their villages because of employment in bordering states have been excluded from the electoral rolls, although they were ordinarily resident of their constituencies and were entitled to be registered as voters under Section 19 of the Representation of People Act, 1950.
3. There has been interference in the process of SIR, particularly in the states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, aimed at preventing the registration of voters from the Muslim community, on the ground that they were illegal residents because their bastis had been demolished. Large scale demolitions seem to have taken place prior to the SIR exercise despite the Election Commission’s press note issued on 19 February 2004 which states that during election periods, demolition of houses or buildings without permission, or eviction of people from them, is prohibited.
4. A large number of persons in slums in metropolitan areas, particularly in Tamil Nadu, have been excluded from the SIR process and their names do not find a place in the draft electoral rolls.
5. Some elderly people have had their names deleted from the final electoral roll in Bihar, and listed as dead, although they are still living. As a consequence, they are facing other problems such as not being paid their old-age pension.
6. A large number of people who have been displaced on account of Salwa Judum activities in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh and have left their place of residence after seeking employment in other states, have not received the enumeration forms and are likely to be left out of the draft electoral rolls.
7. Muslims, Denotified Tribes and tribals, appear to have been disproportionately left out of the rolls.
8. There has been exclusion of tribals in some forest areas, such as the Mudumalai forest of Tamil Nadu, as they have been displaced from their original place of residence because of a government project.
9. There has been a sharp and unexpected drop in women voters. This is at least partly due to the fact that the ECI does not accept parents-in-law as “relatives” and women who have left heir natal villages after marriage cannot easily produce acceptable and verifiable “relatives”
10. Many transgender persons who are bonafide citizens and entitled to be vote under Article 326 of the Constitution of India, appear to have been left out from the SIR process as they are no longer residing with their respective families who have disowned them.
11. There are mistakes with regard to EPIC numbers not matching names, which is leading to deletion of voters’ names.
12. The deletion of any one name automatically adds that person’s family members to the names of deleted voters as they cannot establish parents’ details in voter list. Thus these deletions have a cascading effect.
13. BLOs have been under great pressure in many states and some have taken recourse to the extreme step of suicide.
14. The SIR exercise and its complications are absorbing enormous time from frontline workers such as anganwadi workers and teachers and distracting them from important duties such as teaching and child care.
15. SIR is also causing considerable inconvenience to the public, particularly by making cumbersome demands for documents as well as traceable roots in the 2003 voter lists. These demands are particularly burdensome for women who changed residence after marriage as well as for marginalised communities.
16. SIR is effectively linking voter lists with Aadhaar without due safeguards. Aside from the possibility of harassment or surveillance issues in the future, this casual linkage enables the government to harvest extensive data on individual voters across the country. It is
    not difficult to imagine how this information could be misused.

Conclusion

After hearing the testimonies, the Jury is of the view that the revision of electoral rolls is being carried out hastily and sometimes carelessly. The possibility of mass disenfranchisement is, therefore, real and ominous. It is imperative for the process to be fair and accurate; all eligible voters must be duly registered and should be able to exercise their right to vote. To fulfil these basic requirements, the SIR process needs to be reconsidered and reworked, and until that is done, in the interim, it must be stopped.

(Signed)

Justice Madan Lokur (Retd.)

Justice A.K. Patnaik (Retd.)

Ms. Pamela Philipose

Dr. Jean Drèze

Prof. Nivedita Menon (Retd)