South Asia

The meeting Election Commission held on September 26, 2026 provided certain procedures for voters left out or issued notices during SIR, but fresh cases from Delhi and Karnataka show that the wider machinery through which existing names can be challenged and processed for deletion remains in place

Holding that the 24-hour deadline under Article 22(2) begins with the actual curtailment of liberty, the Court says investigating agencies cannot keep individuals in custody while delaying the formal recording of arrest

A preliminary analysis of Maharashtra’s SIR-2026 draft roll by the Sabar Institute finds that 20.69 million names which is a significant 21.1 % of the state’s 97.9 million electors— close to one in five pre-revision electors — were missing in the draft electoral roll published on August 31, 2026; these voters were placed on the ASDD list; the report also identifies sharp geographical variations in the deletion

The Election Commission has separated the SIR declaration from the statutory Form 6 after two Election Commissioners objected to its inclusion and one called the change “unauthorised/illegal”, the issue comes as the Supreme Court is hearing the separate question of requiring deleted Delhi voters to seek inclusion again through Form 6

SC petitioners Anjali Bharadwaj and Amrita Johri welcome ECI’s Nov 6 communication to seven states on facilitating inclusion of left-out voters

Doley was arrested in July this year for a protest against a hotel project near Kaziranga, and had been booked under the nefarious National Security Act (NSA) after a court granted him bail; Forum for Social Harmony, AMSU-AIKMS and BAA accuse the Assam government of criminalising land rights activism