The SIR exercise in Karnataka has begun amid intense political debate. The Congress-led State government has repeatedly said that it is not opposed to updating electoral rolls but has questioned the manner in which the present framework is being implemented. The concerns stem from issues of transparency, safeguards against wrongful deletions, the use of software in identifying discrepancies and the burden placed on voters.

On the first day of the exercise, Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer V. Anbu Kumar attempted to address several of these concerns by clarifying that Booth Level Officers (BLOs) would not demand any documentary proof during the house-to-house enumeration. At the same time, the State Cabinet and senior ministers continued to seek greater clarity from the Election Commission before the process moves further.

No documents during house-to-house survey, says CEO

Ahead of the commencement of the exercise, Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), V. Anbu Kumar clarified that electors would not be required to produce any documents during the month-long door-to-door enumeration. According to the CEO, BLOs have been instructed only to distribute and collect Enumeration Forms. Documentary verification, he said, is not part of the initial house visit, as Times of India reported

The forms are available in Kannada, though electors may fill them either in Kannada or in English. The Election Commission has also enabled online submission through the Voters’ Service Portal and the ECINET mobile application.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by The Chief Electoral Officer (@ceokarnataka)

The enumeration exercise will continue from June 30 to July 29.

After the completion of the exercise, the draft electoral rolls will be published on August 5. Claims and objections may be filed until September 4, these will be decided by October 3, and the final electoral rolls are scheduled to be published on October 7.

More than 5 cores electors exist in Karnataka

The Election Commission has stated that all 5, 54, 32,314 electors presently enrolled in Karnataka will be covered during the exercise. Around 59,050 Booth Level Officers, supported by supervisors and election officials across districts, have been deployed. BLOs have been instructed to visit every household and, wherever necessary, make up to three visits to ensure that eligible voters are not left out. While the clarification that no documents would be collected during house-to-house visits has addressed one immediate concern, the Election Commission has also imposed a pre-condition that could amount to ensuring exclusions.

The CEO stated that only those electors who submit the filled Enumeration Form within the prescribed period will find their names in the draft electoral rolls. This effectively makes the submission of the form central to the continuation of an elector’s name in the draft roll, even though documentary proof is not being sought during the initial visit. Eligible citizens who have recently turned eighteen or otherwise qualify for enrolment will have to submit Form 6 for inclusion in the electoral rolls, as reported

Logical discrepancies remain one of the biggest concerns

Perhaps the most closely watched aspect of the Karnataka exercise is the identification of so-called “logical discrepancies.” This vague and untested category had amounted to 27 lakh exclusions in West Bengal! The CEO has listed six categories of such ‘logical discrepancies’ that have presently been identified, although the final number will become clear only after the publication of the draft electoral rolls on August 5. Explaining some of these categories, he said notices may be issued where “the age difference between father and child is less than 15 years,” where “the age difference between grandfather and grandson is more than 40 years,” or where there are inconsistencies relating to gender and family relationships.

According to the CEO, Assistant Electoral Registration Officers would issue notices asking electors to submit supporting documents wherever such discrepancies are detected.

However, while examples have been provided, the Election Commission has not yet publicly released the complete methodology, software logic or technical standards through which such discrepancies are identified. It is precisely this lack of transparency that has become the central point of disagreement between the Karnataka government and the Election Commission.

State Cabinet says it supports revision, not arbitrary deletions

A day before the exercise began, the Karnataka Cabinet discussed the SIR process and formally recorded its concerns. The Cabinet maintained that updating electoral rolls is necessary, but insisted that the process must remain transparent, legally sound and free from arbitrary action.

In a detailed statement shared on social media, Home Karnataka Minister Priyank Kharge said that:

“The Karnataka Cabinet supports transparent, evidence-based revision of electoral rolls, but has raised serious concerns about opacity, arbitrariness and possible disenfranchisement in the current SIR framework.”

He further wrote that. “the Cabinet has made it clear, Karnataka supports revision of electoral rolls, not subversion of electoral rolls. The ECI is yet to respond.”

The statement reflects the State government’s position that electoral roll revision itself is not under challenge. Instead, the concerns relate to the manner in which the current framework is proposed to operate. Through the Cabinet’s resolution, Priyank Kharge outlined an extensive set of demands before the SIR process progresses further in Karnataka.

The Karnataka Cabinet supports transparent, evidence-based revision of electoral rolls, but has raised serious concerns about opacity, arbitrariness and possible disenfranchisement in the current SIR framework.

The Cabinet resolved that before SIR is implemented in Karnataka,…

— Priyank Kharge / ಪ್ರಿಯಾಂಕ್ ಖರ್ಗೆ (@PriyankKharge) June 30, 2026

The Cabinet has asked the Election Commission to undertake a full independent review of the entire SIR process, including its legal basis, deletion criteria, supervisory mechanism, software systems and safeguards.

It has also sought an extension of the timeline for submission of Enumeration Forms from one month to at least three months, arguing that the present schedule places undue pressure on Booth Level Officers, election officials and ordinary citizens.

Another major demand relates to transparency. The Cabinet has sought publication of a comprehensive manual explaining every category of “logical discrepancy”, the software or algorithm used to detect such discrepancies, the standard operating procedures, the officials responsible for decision-making and the documents that may be required from electors.

The State government has further demanded that no elector should receive a notice unless a prior physical field verification has been conducted by the Booth Level Officer. It has argued that minor spelling mistakes, clerical errors or transliteration differences should never become grounds for objection.

The Cabinet has also insisted that no voter should be deleted without prior notice, an opportunity to be heard before an impartial authority and a reasoned speaking order.

It has sought clarification on the complete list of admissible documents, reconsideration of the exclusion of Aadhaar and Voter ID wherever applicable, recognition of Karnataka’s Kutumba ID in appropriate cases and assurance that the burden of proving eligibility is not unfairly shifted onto ordinary citizens.

The State government has additionally sought simultaneous processing of valid Form 6 applications and Form 7 objections, safeguards against bulk objections leading to mass deletions, publication of machine-readable daily data relating to notices, additions and deletions, public disclosure and independent testing of all software used in the process, clearer definition of the role of Special Roll Observers and Micro-Observers, and enhanced safeguards for vulnerable groups including women, migrant workers, slum residents, nomadic and de-notified tribes, widows, persons with disabilities, orphans and transgender persons.

While the SIR exercise in Karnataka has commenced, the Election Commission has, so far, not publicly responded to these demands.

CM promises permanent residence certificate for voters

Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar has also intervened on the issue by assuring citizens that the State government would facilitate the issuance of Permanent Residence Certificates for those who require them during the SIR process. The assurance came after concerns were raised about documentation and the practical difficulties faced by many electors in obtaining supporting records, as reported

The Chief Minister has also maintained that the State government will examine legal options depending on the Election Commission’s response to the concerns raised by the Cabinet.

The larger issue is about safeguards, not merely enumeration

Although the Election Commission has repeatedly stated that the objective of the SIR is to ensure an accurate electoral roll, the political debate in Karnataka has increasingly shifted towards procedural safeguards.

Questions are being raised about how discrepancies are identified, who supervises the process, how notices are generated and what legal protections exist before an elector’s name can ultimately be deleted. The clarification that no documents are required during house-to-house visits addresses only one stage of the process. Concerns continue over what happens after the draft electoral roll is published, particularly in cases where notices may be issued on the basis of “logical discrepancies.”

The absence of publicly available technical documentation explaining these discrepancy categories has further contributed to demands for greater transparency.

Fear of wrongful deletion continues to shape public discourse

Among several sections of voters, the discussion around SIR is being shaped not only by the current guidelines but also by concerns arising from earlier electoral roll revision exercises in different parts of the country where allegations of wrongful deletions had led to on ground fear among the marginalised electors.

Political parties and civil society groups have repeatedly argued that even a small number of erroneous deletions can significantly affect citizens because the right to vote depends entirely upon inclusion in the electoral roll.

For many electors, especially elderly persons, migrant workers, tenants, persons living in informal settlements and economically weaker sections, concerns remain about whether procedural requirements can be completed within the prescribed timeline and whether genuine mistakes in records may eventually result in exclusion.

It is against this backdrop that Karnataka’s month-long SIR exercise has begun. While the Election Commission has emphasised participation and administrative preparedness, the State government continues to press for greater transparency, procedural safeguards and stronger protection against wrongful disenfranchisement. The coming weeks—leading up to the publication of the draft electoral rolls on August 5—are likely to determine whether these concerns are addressed through administrative clarification or result in the wrongful disenfranchisement of existing electors.

Related:

Exclusive Investigation SIR: How many voters did the ECI actually disenfranchise? Why do final figures show inexplicable ‘additions’?

Judgement delivered, paradox prevails: every voter a citizen, but what is the fate of 51.8 million excluded?

SC greenlights SIR, upholds ECI’s power to revise electoral rolls

The Bihar Verdict 2025: How an election was engineered before votes were cast

The post Karnataka launches SIR with 5.5 crore voters, State Govt voices transparency concerns appeared first on SabrangIndia.

With an absence of transparency –names and identities – of deleted and new voter influx—the question we ask is this:

Are new voter registrations transparent following due process, and what criteria were implemented to simply deny existing voters their right to vote?

The Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) shows clear data errors across the country. Instead of a clear, transparent and logical process, the official figures leave 2.79 crore voters (27.9 million) unaccounted for. This means that millions have been disenfranchised without either explanation, reasons given or judicial scrutiny: besides this huge number of Indian electors have not even been properly categorised in the act of removal/deletion: are they deceased, have they shifted/moved their location (?) or do they have duplicate entries? This unilateral and arbitrary deletion/exclusion has already –in states ruled by the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – cost them survival besides the right to vote: People removed from these lists are today in danger of losing their government benefits we repeat, without any independent scrutiny by an independent judicial authority.

In West Bengal and Bihar alone, the state governments –elected on the basis of this faultily implemented SIR–have simply announced –without policy discussion or judicial scrutiny –that the ‘new voters lists’ will be regarded as the final electoral list and linked this to welfare programmes. Both states are now ruled by the extreme right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a political behemoth that has –in close collusion with a non-transparent Election Commission of India (ECI) been a “beneficiary” of this SIR process.

Put clearly, if a person’s name is removed from the voter list, their ration card is deactivated, monthly cash transfers are stopped, and even their bank accounts face cancellation. There are also local reports of the possibility of unilateral deletion from agricultural land records, especially if you are a disenfranchised voter from Murshidabad and Malda, Muslim majority districts! This policy effectively treats a deleted voter as someone who has lost their official status as a citizen without the final adjudication of their citizenship status.

State & UT wise deletion data discrepancy

The ECI’s entire 2025-2026 SIR process was/is 3-layered:

• Enumeration Phase
• Publication of Draft Roll, Claims and
• Objections Period and publication of the Final Roll.

A close scrutiny of the official electoral data spanning 14 States and Union Territories where the SIR was hurriedly conducted tells a mathematically impossible story.

This exclusive deep-dive investigation by Vote for Democracy and SabrangIndia reveals the dark holes behind the mass deletions.

The official SIR data released by the ECI for 14 States and UTs contains significant inconsistencies. While the ECI has published aggregate figures of additions and deletions, it has not provided complete details explaining how the final electoral rolls were arrived at. This makes independent verification of the data difficult.

According to the ECI final data, 5.29 crore electors were deleted during the SIR exercise. However, the ECI has not disclosed complete details regarding these electors, including the categories under which they were deleted, their constituency-wise distribution, whether all such deletions attained finality, or whether any cases remained under adjudication, appeal, or other verification processes at the time of publication of the final rolls.

1. The ECI has reported that 1.87 crore new electors were added through Forms 6 and 6A applications^[1]. However, it has not specifically disclosed the categories to which these electors belong, whether they were first-time voters, previously deleted electors seeking re-enrolment, migrated voters, overseas electors, or any other category. Nor has it disclosed the district-wise and constituency-wise break-up of these additions.
2. The SIR exercise began with 61.38 crore electors. After deleting 5.29 crore electors and adding 1.87 crore electors, the final electoral roll should have contained approximately 57.96 crore electors. However, the final electoral rolls published by the ECI show only 55.17 crore electors including 1.87 crore newly added electors, leaving an unexplained gap of about 2.79 crore “Vanished Electors”
3. Further, a total of 7.16 crore electors (5.29 crore deletions and 1.87 crore additions) were affected by the SIR process, yet the ECI has not disclosed sufficient particulars regarding their status, category, or basis of inclusion/deletion. The absence of such information raises serious concerns regarding transparency, accuracy, and the reliability of the published electoral data.

Note: We have attempted to rely on figures and facts available from the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the respective Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs). Wherever neither the ECI nor the CEOs have provided the relevant data, we have been compelled to rely on information reported in the press, as no official alternative is available to the public. Since the ECI has not made the complete data available in a scientific and statistically verifiable format, it has become necessary to depend on multiple secondary sources for the purposes of this analysis.

Who then are these unexplained 5.29 crore final voters from 14 states, what has been the process followed for their inclusion into the final Voter’s List? The Table below explains the illogical process of deletions/inclusions, state-wise[2]:

Total deletion in SIR across the 14 States/UTs and Form 6/6A/additions

Bihar

The final press release^[4] of the ECI related to Bihar dated September 30, 2025 stated 3.66 lakh names were permanently deleted after detailed statutory verification, while 21.53 lakh eligible electors were added through Form-6 (First Time Voter) applications during claims-and-objections process. We have downloaded the press release and it may be accessed here. As a result, the final electoral roll stood at approximately 7.42 crore electors. At first glance, the Commission presented these figures as evidence of a successful correction mechanism that enabled genuine electors to re-enter the electoral database. However, a closer examination of the numbers reveals a significant discrepancy.

The pre-SIR electoral roll contained 7.89 crore electors, whereas the finalised roll contained 7.42 crore electors. This represents a net reduction of approximately 47 lakh electors. Yet the numerical explanation offered by the Commission does not fully account for this decline.

If 3.66 lakh names were permanently removed after verification and 21.53 lakh electors were subsequently added, the total deletions and additions totals 25.19 lakh electors. However, the final roll has an unexplained deficit of 21.81 lakh Voters whose removal/absence has simply not been explained by the ECI!

Questions raised in Investigation:

• Who are these Voters, from which Districts in Bihar and what is their gender and other identity?
• Do the Bihari and Indian people not deserve to know?

Conclusion: The entire SIR process therefore has been clouded in opacity. Reasons are that there has been absence of any clarity on the following category-wise distinctions and therefore no reconciliation of possible overlaps:

A. The ECI has not disclosed who these newly added electors are or the districts and constituencies in which they have been added. This information is crucial for understanding the impact of the SIR process.

B. The ECI has stated that electors whose names were deleted during the SIR Enumeration process may seek re-enrolment by filing Form 6

C. However, Form No. 6 [only for the registration of new voter as amended], as amended[5] by the Ministry of Law and Justice through the Notification dated 17.06.2022, requires every applicant to declare that he or she has never been enrolled as an elector before. This creates a serious difficulty for persons whose names were deleted during the SIR process. Such individuals were previously registered voters and therefore cannot truthfully make a declaration that they were never electors.

D. The requirement effectively compels deleted electors to submit a false declaration in order to seek re-enrolment. This is particularly concerning because the ECI’s own guidelines warn against furnishing false information or making incorrect declarations in electoral forms.

E. Form 6a additions ( Overseas Voters-(New Voters post 2011/shifted Voters) who and in which districts/constituencies they have been added: Form 6a additions ( Overseas Voters) who and in which districts/constituencies have this category of voters been added

F. Form 7 (permanent deletions by a process initiated by others) with no details of the veracity or transparency of the process – who has been removed and from which districts/constituencies they have been removed;

G. Form 8 relates to shifting of residence/correction of entries in existing electoral roll)– which Voters have been removed on accordance of shifting and from which districts/constituencies they have been removed & which Voter details have been corrected.

Please note that giving any false statement made in the DECLARATION portion is a punishable offence under Section 31 of the Representation of People Act 1950 with imprisonment with term which may extend to one year or with fine or with both);

Declaration form can be seen/accessed here.

West Bengal

On February 28, 2026, the Chief Electoral Officer, West Bengal, released a press release^[6] announcing the publication of the final electoral roll and electorate data. In West Bengal, the baseline electorate started at 7,66,37,529 names. The Commission notified deletions in the Draft Roll of 58,20,899 Voters, which, thereafter, inexplicably ballooned to a Final Deletion figure of 83.86 Lakh names—an un-categorised surge of over 25.65 Lakh voter removals.

When applying the documented Final Deletions and adding the 1,82,036 new voters from Form 6/6A, the mathematically expected final roll should logically total 6,84,33,565 (7,66,37,529 – 83.86 Lakh + 1,82,036). Instead, the published data of General Electors post SIR in West Bengal[7] depicts the same to be 6,44,52,609.

This creates an unexplained expulsion/ decrease in the Electoral Rolls of 39,80,956 electors, proving that the final published database does not reconcile with the documented additions and removals.

Questions raised in Investigation:

• Who are these 39, 80, 956 Voters, from which Districts in Bengal and what is their gender and other identity?
• Do the Bengali and Indian people not deserve to know?

(Even if we count the 27.10 lakh removed on basis of “logical discrepancies”, the figures leave an unexplained gap of 12, 70, 956 electors, a number still unexplained given the mathematical subtraction.)[8]

Conclusion: The entire SIR process therefore has been clouded in opacity. Reasons are that there has been absence of any clarity on the following category-wise distinctions and therefore no reconciliation of possible overlaps:

Uttar Pradesh

The electoral database for Uttar Pradesh began with a pre-SIR electorate of 15, 44, 30,092 voters (15.44 crore). According to the Election Commission’s final SIR data published on April 10, 2026[9], 2, 88, 74, 067 names were deleted from the Draft Roll, while 2, 04, 45, 300 names were ultimately deleted in the Final Roll. The Commission therefore recorded that there has been an addition of 84, 28, 767 electors between the Draft and Final Rolls which may have occurred due to redressal hearings, or registrations through Forms 6 and 6A. However, the ECI has failed to published the category wise addition of 84, 28, 767 electors in the Final Electoral Roll that now stands at 13, 39, 84,792 voters (13.40 crore).

Link to the downloaded document: https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042536090402459712?s=20

The official figures for Uttar Pradesh reveal a striking anomaly! The electorate, after the conduct of the SIR in the state,  exactly equals the pre-SIR electorate minus the final deletions (15, 44, 30, 792 – 2,04,45,300 = 13,39,84,792). In other words, the final roll can be fully explained without accounting for a single one of the 84, 28, 767 newly added electors. This implies an unexplained increase of 84, 28, 767 electors (84.29 lakh)—a figure for which no corresponding category of deletion or adjustment has been disclosed in the published data.

Questions raised in Investigation:

Again, vis a vis Uttar Pradesh (UP) we ask who are these 84, 28, 767 voters and do the people of UP and India not deserve to know their names and the districts where they have been added/included as Voters?

Conclusion: Such a massive number of additions without granular data on categories deleted and added, and how, raised more questions than it answers

Link to the downloaded document: https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042535765822050811?s=20

Assam

Similarly, in Assam[10] what was conducted was a different process. Here, in this state already racked by a Citizenship Crisis of unspeakable dimensions, what took place was a Special Revision (SR) of the rolls. The difference between the SIR and SR is this: Updation of the existing Electoral Rolls takes place through house-to-house visits. Hence in this north-easten state, as many as 29656 BLOs (Block Level Officers) conducted the exercise and visited the homes of 2,52,02,775 electors present in the pre-SR rolls. In addition a new category of persons, BLAs (Block Level Agents) assisted the process. [This category of persons while open to all political parties was criticised as favouring the ruling BJP who have a formidable network of “Panna Pramukhs” (area wise agents). These BLAs were “trained” by the Election Commission through a new initiative.]

Link to the downloaded document: https://newsonair.gov.in/eci-publishes-final-voter-list-for-special-revision-in-assam-extends-west-

The Draft electoral rolls published on December 12, 2025 after the Special Revision contained 2, 52, 01, 624 electors. Only 1151 electors, according to the ECI were deleted in total at this stage from the existing rolls. However, a scrutiny of the Final Rolls published on February 10, 2026 contained 2, 49, 58.139 electors. This significant deletion, that is the removal of 2, 43, 485 electors after the Draft Rolls were published has not been explained or defined by the ECI.

Reasons for the removal of these Voters and details of the hearings and adjudications have not been made public. No details are available about the persons and process who filed objections for such a large number of electors after the publication of the Draft Roll in Assam. The actual published final roll is 2,49,58,139, presenting a structural reduction of 2,44,636 electors that are missing from the final elector roll.

Questions raised in Investigation:

Put differently, our investigation of the available official numbers from the ECI shows that as many 2,44,636 Voters have disappeared from the Final Voters list and these include some of those originally dropped at the Draft Roll stage as also some from the Form 6/6A additions!

• Do the people of Assam and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Assam they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Gujarat

Pre-SIR, the state of Gujarat contained 5,08,43,436 electors. However, the Draft Electoral Rolls published the names of 4,34,70,109 electors. Around 73.7 Lakh (73,72,711) names of the electors were deleted in the Draft Roll initially, in the final roll published^[11] on February 17, 2026 the number recorded was 4,40,30,725 electors ECI’s official figures reveal that there were 5.60 Lakh additions through various modes including Form 6/6A.

Link to the downloaded document: https://newsonair.gov.in/election-commission-of-india-releases-final-electoral-roll-for-gujarat/

Question raised in Investigation:

Examining these figures leads to the following mathematical conclusion: an expected final electoral database of 4,40,30,725 electors and 68,12,711 were the final deleted voters. (68,12,711 + 5.60 Lakh = 73,72,711 electors).

The Gujarat figures reveal that the initial draft deletion of 73,72,711 electors in the Draft Roll and 68,12,711 final deletions & about 5.60 lakh additions in the Final Roll. However, the published data does not clarify whether these 5.60 lakh additions were entirely fresh inclusions through Forms 6/6A or whether some were electors initially omitted from the Draft Roll and later restored/re-enrolled. The Election Commission has also not published a category-wise reconciliation showing how many deletions occurred through Form 7, how many claims were accepted, how many cases remain under adjudication, or how many electors were restored. In the absence of such data, the movement of electors between deletion, restoration, and addition categories cannot be independently verified.

Question raised in Investigation:

However, the published SIR Final Roll is 4,40,30,725. This again leaves an unexplained decline in deletions of a 5.60 lakh Voters.

Do the people of Gujarat and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Gujarat they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Madhya Pradesh

Before the SIR exercise, Madhya Pradesh had 5.74 crore registered voters. After the draft voter list was published on December 23, 2025, the Election Commission reported having received enrolment forms of 5,31,31,983 electors: ECI explained that as many as 42,74,160 deletions were carried out due to non-receipt of forms. A point to note is: It is strange that not even a single enrolment form received was rejected!. Another curious fact is that in MP –something not observed from an analysis in other states–as many as 8, 49, 082 electors who failed to submit enrolment forms were permitted “re-entry” into electoral rolls during the adjudication process after the publication of the Draft Rolls.

The final figures for the state, released by the ECI on February 21, 2026[12], the Commission recorded 34,25,078 final deletions and 8,49,082 new voters added through various modes including acceptance of Forms 6 and 6A.

Link to our document: https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025184572451836070?s=20

Despite the abovementioned figures, the published Final Voter List contains only 5,39,81,065 voters.

Question Raised in Investigation

The Madhya Pradesh (MP) figures do not fully reconcile. Starting SIR with 5.74 crore electors and after 34,25,078 final deletions and 8,49,082 additions, the expected final electorate should be significantly higher than the published figure of 5,39,81,065.

The data also shows that 8,49,082 electors who had initially not submitted enrolment forms were later brought back during adjudication. However, the Election Commission has not explained how these electors were classified, nor has it accounted for the gap between the expected and published final figures, leaving a portion of the electorate mathematically unexplained.

Do the people of Madhya Pradesh (MP) and India not deserve to know as to what were the specific factors that created such an accurate process (unlike other states) that reflected the fact that all enrolment form were absolutely in-order?

Do they not have any right to know as to who were the actual new electors added through the SIR process and from which districts in Madhya Pradesh (MP) they fall?

Also, who were such old electors who had been compelled to re-enrol through the Form 6 and 6A process that essentially entails making a false declaration that they were not previous voters and from which districts in Madhya Pradesh (MP) they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Chhattisgarh

Before the SIR exercise, Chhattisgarh had about 2.12 crore registered voters. The Draft Electoral Rolls published after the first stage of scrutiny by the ECI published 1, 84, 95, 920 names. Thus, the Draft Voter List recorded 27.34 lakh deletions.

In the final figures published on February 21, 2026, the Election Commission reported a further deletion of 1,08,807 electors from the Draft Rolls while at the same time it added 2, 34, 994 new voters added through inclusions of the Forms 6 and 6A categories. Based on these numbers, voters clearly have been deleted without any category-wise explanation for the deletions.

However, the published final voter list contains only 1, 87, 30, 914 voters. This leaves an unexplained gap of nearly 25.95 lakh voters whose status is not explained in the published data. The figures do not clarify whether these voters were deleted, carried forward, kept under adjudication, or removed through any other category.

Link to our document: https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025108711291650148?s=20

Question Raised in Investigation

• Do the people of Chhattisgarh and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Chhattisgarh they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Rajasthan

The SIR data of Rajasthan presents one of the clearest inconsistencies in the published figures. Before the SIR exercise, the state had 5,48,84,479 registered voters as per the ECI figure. The electors published in the Draft Electoral Rolls were 5,04,71,324 voters. The number of electors reflected in the final figures published^[13] on February 21, 2026 showed total 31,36,286 deletions and 2,42,760 further deletions from the draft rolls and 12,91,365 additions through Forms 6 and 6A but the status of the rest 8,56,304 electors remains unclear due to the lack of any specific classification or explanation regarding these addition) in those rolls.

There are discrepancies however. The Voters s shown by the ECI before the conduct of the SIR is less by 2,28,264 electors than the figure shows by the central CEO in its press releases. The data also fails to clearly account for the whereabouts and categorised figure of over 31 lakh-deleted electors. This discrepancy itself raises more questions than it answers!

Link to our document: https://cms.patrika.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SIR-Final-Publication-Rajasthan.pdf

Question Raised in Investigation

The published data does not explain this difference or whereabouts of deleted voters nor the reasons behind deletions/discrepancies.

• Do the people of Rajasthan and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Rajasthan they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu began the SIR exercise with 6,41,14,587 voters. The Draft Voter List removed 97, 37, 831 names, reducing the electorate to 5,43,76,756. During the claims and objections period, 27.53 lakh voters were added through Forms 6 and 6A, while another 4.23 lakh names were deleted.

The Final Voter List published on February 23, 2026[14] stood at 5,67,07,380 voters, reflecting a net and unexplained deduction of 74,07,207 voters from the pre-SIR electorate.

Link to our document: https://x.com/airnewsalerts/status/2025924114599600147?s=20\

Question Raised in Investigation

• Do the people of Tamil Nadu and India not deserve to know who the deletion voters are (their names) and from which districts in Tamil Nadu they fall?

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Kerala

Kerala had 2,78,59,855 voters as per CEO Kerala when the SIR exercise began in November 2025. The Draft Voter List published^[15] on December 23, 2025 excluded 24,17,503 names classified as absent, dead or shifted, bringing the electorate down to 2,54,42,352 in the draft list. During the verification process, notices were issued to 19.32 lakh voters to establish their link with the 2002 electoral roll, while 17.56 lakh voters underwent hearings over logical discrepancies.

After objections were considered, 15, 11, 292 voters were added and 53,229 more names were deleted. The Final Electoral Roll published^[16] on February 21, 2026 contains 2,70,52,007 voters, a net reduction of 9,59,440 voters from the pre-SIR electorate that is unexplained by category or reasoning.

Link to our document: https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/draft-electorate-23-12-2025.pdf; https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/final_electorate_sir_2026.pdf

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of transparency and clear reasoning given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Kerala and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

Goa and Andaman & Nicobar Islands

Goa had 11,85,034 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The Draft Voter List published on December 16, 2025 removed 1,00,042 names, bringing the voter count down to 10,84,992. The Election Commission also identified 1,82,403 voters as “unmapped” and 58,923 voters as having “logical discrepancies”, whose cases were later examined through notices, hearings and document checks. During the claims & objections period, 12,166 new voters were added (Form 6,6A), while 39,592 names were finally deleted, including 35,780 voters declared ineligible after scrutiny.

The final voter list published^[17] on February 21, 2026 contained 10, 57, 566 voters.

Link to our document: https://ceogoa.nic.in/PDF/SIR2026/press-note-Final-publication.pdf

Question raised in Investigation:

However, the figures raise a basic question that if 1, 00, 042 names were removed in the Draft List, why do the final figures show only 39,592 deletions? The published data does not clearly explain what happened to the remaining voters who were initially removed, or how the large number of unmapped and discrepancy-flagged voters were ultimately accounted for in the final roll.

• In the absence of clear reasoning given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Goa and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Conclusion: This opacity and non-transparency regarding the fundamental right to Vote creates suspicion, as if the entire process has been conducted in a pre-determined and partisan manner.

The Andaman & Nicobar Islands[18] had 3,10,404 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published on December 23, 2025 removed 64,014 names, reducing the electorate to 2,46,390. During the claims and objections period, 16,919 voters were added through Forms 6, 6A and 8, while 5,269 names were deleted.

The final voter list published on February 21, 2026 contains 2,58,040 voters, matching the additions and deletions recorded after the draft stage. However, compared to the pre-SIR electorate, the final roll is lower by 52,364 voters. While the final deletion figure records only 5,269 removals, the published data does not explain how this overall reduction of 52,364 voters was arrived at, or how many of the 64,014 names deleted in the draft list were restored after verification or not.

Linkto our document: https://x.com/Andaman_Admin/status/2025442063752511792?s=20

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of clear reasoning’s given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Andaman & Nicobar and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Puducherry

Puducherry had 10, 21,578 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published on December 16, 2025 removed 1,03,467 names, reducing the electorate to 9,18,111 voters. During the claims and objections period, 41,492 voters were added, 16,619 more names were deleted, and 1,227 voters were marked as shifted outside the state.

Link to our document: https://x.com/ceopuducherry/status/2022544949041074407?s=20

The final electoral roll published on February 14, 2026[19] contains 9,44,211 voters. While the final figures broadly reconcile with the draft roll and subsequent additions, the data leaves key questions unanswered. Of the 1,03,467 voters removed at the draft stage, the final roll remains lower than the pre-SIR electorate by 77,367 voters. The published data does not explain how many of the initially deleted voters were restored, how many of the 41,492 additions were genuinely new voters or some of were existing voters? and how many were previously deleted electors who were later reinstated after verification.

Question raised in Investigation:

In the absence of clear reasoning’s given by the ECI nor categories of additions/deletions, people of Puducherry and India are in the dark of who these deleted voters are (names) and from which districts of the state they fall!

Lakshadweep

Lakshadweep had 57,813 registered voters before the SIR exercise. The draft voter list published^[20] on December 16, 2025 removed 1,429 names, including 705 deceased voters, 210 permanently shifted voters, 472 duplicate enrolments, 41 untraceable or absent voters, and one voter who refused to sign, reducing the electorate to 56,384 voters.

Link to our document: https://www.facebook.com/100064880013259/posts/press-note-14022026-publication-of-final-electoral-roll-2026election-commission-/1363754245797230/

During the claims and objections period, 1,270 voters were added and 47 more names were deleted. The final electoral roll published on February 14, 2026 contains 57,607 voters. While the final figures broadly reconcile, the electorate remains 206 voters lower than the pre-SIR roll. The published data does not indicate whether these 206 voters were deleted during verification, shifted to another category, or excluded for any other reason.

Note: It was difficult to obtain all the relevant PDFs and official records, as several final press notes, bulletins and related documents were not readily available on the ECI website. For this reason, data was compiled from official social media posts of the Election Commission and Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs), CEO websites, press notes, and other official source links. References to the deletion of SIR bulletins and press notes from the ECI website have not been included here, as the analysis relies only on documents and data that could be independently accessed from official sources.

The major difficulty in the data analysis has been the inconsistency between the data published by the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the respective Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) on the same issue. In many instances, explicit data has not been provided, and even the data released by the ECI reveals discrepancies. Further, the data has not been presented in a uniform format across States and Union Territories. The ECI has failed to adhere to basic principles of data management and statistical reporting, as the data should be presented in a consistent, sequential, and standardised manner to enable accurate analysis and comparison.

No final transparency or clarity on what were the categories of removals

A macro-analysis of the database across all 14 States and UTs (except Assam) reveals a severe systemic failure in the reconciliation of electoral figures, showing that there is absolutely no final match or clarity on what were the categories of removals.

In sum, the pre-revision electorate across these States/UTs stood at 61.38 Crore. While subtracting the officially declared total “Final Deletions” of 5.29 Crore and adding the 1.87 Crore newly added Form 6 and Form 6A voters etc.—the expected final database should logically rest at 57.96 Crore.( Leaving aside Assam).

However, the officially published SIR Final Roll aggregates to a figure which is at variance and the figures given by various CEOs and the ECI at different occasions does not match and different claims are made that makes the picture too hazy to be recognized.

This failure to mathematically bridge the gap between the initial and final rolls leaves a staggering, un-reconciled macro-level discrepancy of Crores of electors. Every single state exhibits this structural dissonance. These unexplained numerical variances expose a hidden layer of alleged database manipulation. The officially recorded final deletions are completely out of consonance with the initial draft deletions 7.33 Crore and the actual net modifications executed on the ground.

Instead of providing a transparent, categorised breakdown of these removals—such as designating them as deceased, permanently shifted, or duplicate entries—the data reflects opaque, un-categorised bulk adjustments. The introduction of the clause of logical discrepancies midway in West Bengal , that to applied discriminately and arbitrarily makes the exercise smack of pre-determination and partisan administrative “purging” of the Electoral Roll and therefore the Constitutional Right to Vote!

SIR deletions linked to welfare benefits

The newly elected BJP governments in West Bengal and Bihar indicated that persons whose names were deleted from electoral rolls might also lose access to welfare benefits. In West Bengal, ministers stated that individuals removed through the SIR process would not be eligible for government schemes, though those whose cases are pending before appellate tribunals and certain applicants under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) would continue to receive benefits

The West Bengal government has weaponised the outcomes of the SIR to aggressively filter beneficiaries under the public distribution system. By instructing the food and supplies department to mark the ration cards of deleted voters as inactive, the state has explicitly equated electoral exclusion with nutritional deprivation.

Individuals marked as absent, shifted, duplicate, or dead in the draft lists, alongside unmapped voters and those removed post-adjudication, now face immediate ineligibility for fundamental food security. While temporary reprieves exist for those navigating the labyrinthine appellate tribunals or seeking refuge under the Citizenship Amendment Act, these are mere pauses in a broader trajectory of exclusion. These administrative decisions post-SIR extends beyond food supplies, with over thirty lakh beneficiaries of a targeted cash transfer scheme for women also rendered ineligible following their removal from the voter database in West Bengal.

In Bihar, Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary said that persons deleted from the electoral roll would be ineligible for ration and other welfare schemes, and even suggested that their bank passbooks could be cancelled in due course. The announcements have sparked concerns because the Election Commission has consistently maintained before the Supreme Court that exclusion from the electoral roll does not amount to a determination of citizenship and does not terminate an individual’s citizenship status. The move to link deletion from the electoral roll with denial of welfare benefits raises serious legal concerns, as it effectively treats exclusion from the voter list as proof of non-citizenship without any formal determination of citizenship status.

ECI launched SIR Phase-III

Following the unexplained mass deletion of voters in earlier phases, the Election Commission has now launched the controversial SIR Phase-III across 16 States and 3 UTs. The states included in this phase are Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana, and Uttarakhand. The Union Territories covered are the National Capital Territory of Delhi, Chandigarh, and Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman & Diu and temporarily leaving out only Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, and Ladakh. The above States/UTs covering a total electorate of 36.73 crore voters.

While the reasons behind the deletions in the first two phases remain unclear, the exercise is now being expanded to a much larger population based on the same non-transparent and unaccountable process. The SIR process conducted in 2025-26 and now expanded to other states is a violation of both Election Law and Rules.

The Commission must account for every voter affected by the revision process. In an exercise of this scale, even a single voter cannot disappear into the statistics. The responsibility lies squarely with the Election Commission to ensure that no citizen is wrongly removed from the electoral rolls and deprived of the right to vote through a hurried and heavy handed revision process.

Instead what the ECI has already done is snatched away the Right to Vote from 27.9 million Indians without rigour or reason.

^[1] New 18 years plus voters, However ECI wanted those who were deleted in SIR Enumeration to apply on Form No. 6 and Supreme Court directed the Political Parties to activate their BLAs to help such electors who stood deleted

[2] https://www.elections.tn.gov.in/ASD_19122025.aspx

^[3] General electors notified post SIR in declaration of election

^[4] https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2173316&reg=48&lang=2

[5] https://ceoodisha.nic.in/en/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Amendments-ER-Press-Points-.pdf

^[6] https://ceowestbengal.wb.gov.in/Downloads/News/Final%20Press%20Note%20CEO-PN-05-2026.pdf: in the declaration of elections vide release dated 15.03.2026 by ECI

[7] https://ceowestbengal.wb.gov.in/Downloads/News/Final%20Press%20Note%20CEO-PN-05-2026.pdf

[8] When this staggering number of 27. 10 lakh of Voters excluded under the vague/unexplained category of “logical discrepancy was pointed out to the Supreme Court, the SC inexplicably ruled that they could be denied their right to vote this election, 2026, and brought back in the next election if their case is found to be genuine!!

[9] https://x.com/ceoup/status/2042535765822050811?s=20

[10] https://newsonair.gov.in/eci-publishes-final-voter-list-for-special-revision-in-assam-extends-west-

^[11] https://newsonair.gov.in/election-commission-of-india-releases-final-electoral-roll-for-gujarat/

[12] https://x.com/PTI_News/status/2025184572451836070?s=20

^[13] https://cms.patrika.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SIR-Final-Publication-Rajasthan.pdf

[14] https://x.com/airnewsalerts/status/2025924114599600147?s=20\

^[15] https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/draft-electorate-23-12-2025.pdf

^[16] https://www.ceo.kerala.gov.in/uploads/sir-2026/final_electorate_sir_2026.pdf

^[17] https://ceogoa.nic.in/PDF/SIR2026/press-note-Final-publication.pdf

[18] https://x.com/Andaman_Admin/status/2025442063752511792?s=20

[19] https://x.com/ceopuducherry/status/2022544949041074407?s=20

^[20] https://ceolakshadweep.gov.in/Users/download_pdf_press_notes/UHJlc3MgTm90ZS0gUHVibGljYXRpb24gb 2YgRHJhZnQgRWxlY3RvcmFsIFJvbGwgKDEpLnBkZg==

Related:

Judgement delivered, paradox prevails: every voter a citizen, but what is the fate of 51.8 million excluded?

SC greenlights SIR, upholds ECI’s power to revise electoral rolls

The Bihar Verdict 2025: How an election was engineered before votes were cast

The post Exclusive Investigation SIR: How many voters did the ECI actually disenfranchise? Why do final figures show inexplicable ‘additions’? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The verdict brings to a close one of the most significant constitutional controversies concerning electoral administration in recent years. While the judgment conclusively answers the question of whether the Election Commission possesses the authority to undertake a SIR, it leaves several substantive concerns unresolved. The challenge before the Court was never confined merely to the legality of electoral roll revision. Rather, it centred upon whether an exercise ostensibly intended to identify eligible electors had, in practice, transformed into a process requiring already registered voters to re-establish their entitlement to remain on the electoral roll, thereby blurring the distinction between verification of electoral eligibility and an unregulated (by law or authority) scrutiny of citizenship.

While upholding the ECI’s powers, the Division Bench simultaneously issued a series of directions intended to regulate the consequences of deletions arising from the SIR exercise. Yet it is within these directions themselves that some of the most difficult constitutional questions continue to persist

The sudden introduction and expansion of SIR and the deletion of crores of electors

One of the most consequential yet insufficiently examined aspects of the SIR exercise is its unprecedented scale and the magnitude of voter deletions that followed its implementation across multiple States. No previous exercise of its kind under Election Law or Practice has ever had such intent or result. It is there then that this verdict –by failing to engage in the crucial gaps and issues in implementation highlighted by the multifarious Petitioners—substantively falters.

The result is this: While the Supreme Court has, after rigorous hearings and several interim orders, ultimately upheld the constitutional validity of the SIR framework and accepted the Election Commission of India’s justification (that the exercise was intended to enhance the accuracy, completeness and integrity of electoral rolls). The moot question of what necessitated the adoption of an extraordinary and intensive verification mechanism when the Representation of the People Act, 1950, the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, and the established system of continuous revision already provides for detailed procedures for the addition, correction and deletion of names from electoral rolls remains unanswered.

2023-2024, two years prior to the launch of the Bihar SIR in June 2025 were also marked by related issues that directly impact on the autonomy and functioning of the Election Commission of India (ECI) a hitherto constitutional authority that enjoyed broad respect and acceptance. The present Regime’s overturning of a Supreme Court of India (SCI) final judgement on the need for wider choice and representation (including that of the Chief Justice of India-CJI) in selection of the CEC etc. is one such. The other is the huge accountability crisis in counting methods and transparency by the ECI around the Lok Sabha Polls of 2024, reports around which may be read here and here. Given the outcry by citizens groups and Opposition parties around “Vote Chori” and manipulation during and post 2024 LS polls (including the Haryana, Maharashtra state elections), the ECI even arbitrarily decided to amend its own Rules in ensuring availability of the CCTV footage during electors voting after the scheduled time, storage and counting to citizens and candidates.

The SIR 2-25-2026 was therefore conducted under a shroud of allegations and scrutiny. Thereafter follows the May 27 judgement of the apex court that in a sense obliterates these background developments.

The judgment recognises the Commission’s constitutional authority under Article 324 and Section 21(3) of the Act, yet neither the Court nor the Commission appears to have fully explained why existing statutory mechanisms were considered inadequate or incapable of addressing concerns relating to migration, duplication, deaths or ineligible entries. The absence of such justification becomes particularly significant when the practical outcome of the exercise has been the near arbitrary removal/deletion of crores of electors which according to some reports reach around 5.18 crore (51.8 million!!) electors across thirteen states union territories. Though the Election Commission has uploaded on its web page, the receipt and the digitalisation of enumeration forms  of each state frequently yet it skipped the uploading of the draft rolls , final rolls and the deletions on the same site. Consequently, one has to rely on round about figures of state wise deletions for reference from various unconfirmed sources and the same are depicted in the table below:

Impact of SIR across the States

The Bihar exercise, initiated through the Election Commission’s notification dated June 24, 2025, became the foundation upon which the SIR model was subsequently replicated in twelve other States and Union Territories. According to the available figures, the cumulative impact of these exercises resulted in the deletion of approximately 5.18 crore names from electoral rolls covering an electorate of nearly 60 crore electors.

The scale of these deletions was unprecedented in the history of electoral roll revision in India. Uttar Pradesh alone witnessed deletions exceeding 2.05 crore electors, while West Bengal recorded deletions of approximately 83.86 lakhs: rather 85.12 lakh names from as much as total electors of Bengal by ECI are recorded at 6.81 crore names. Tamil Nadu saw nearly 74 lakh deletions form the original electorate at the start of the SIR. Deletions are high in Gujrat and UP also.  Even smaller jurisdictions such as Goa, Puducherry, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep recorded deletions running into significant proportions of their total electorate.

These figures raise an important constitutional question: When a bureaucratic exercise hurriedly undertaken in the name of electoral ‘purification’ results in the such mass exclusion of more than five crore (50 million) registered voters, should not the burden of transparency and accountability correspondingly become more exacting and higher?

Bihar as the testing ground of SIR

The Bihar experience illustrates the complexity of this concern. Before the commencement of the SIR exercise, Bihar’s electoral roll consisted of approximately 7.89 crore registered electors. Following the intensive revision process, the draft electoral roll published by the Election Commission contained only 7.24 crore electors. This meant that nearly 65 lakh individuals who had previously appeared on the electoral roll were absent from the draft roll. The Commission attributed a substantial portion of this reduction to the non-submission or non-collection of Enumeration Forms during the verification process. However, the omission of such a large number of previously enrolled electors at the draft stage immediately generated concerns regarding the practical consequences of a documentation-based verification exercise conducted within compressed timelines and under challenging administrative conditions.

The Commission subsequently issued its final press release on September 30, 2025 announcing the completion of the Bihar SIR. According to the data disclosed therein, 3.66 lakh names were permanently deleted after detailed statutory verification, while 21.53 lakh eligible electors were either restored or added through Form-6 applications and the claims-and-objections process. As a result, the final electoral roll stood at approximately 7.42 crore electors. At first glance, the Commission presented these figures as evidence of a successful correction mechanism that enabled genuine electors to re-enter the electoral database. However, a closer examination of the numbers available from various sources reveals a significant discrepancy.

The pre-SIR electoral roll contained approximately 7.89 crore electors, whereas the finalised roll contained 7.42 crore electors. This represents a net reduction of approximately 47 lakh electors.

This discrepancy is not merely statistical. It goes to the heart of the transparency and accountability concerns that surrounded the SIR exercise from the beginning. Electoral rolls are the foundational instruments through which the constitutional guarantee of universal adult suffrage under Article 326 is operationalised. Consequently, when millions of names disappear from electoral rolls during a revision exercise, a clear and comprehensive explanation becomes essential. The available public figures explain certain categories of additions and deletions, but they do not adequately account for the entire difference between the pre-revision and post-revision electorate. In the absence of a detailed category-wise reconciliation identifying how and why the remaining electors ceased to form part of the final database, the figures disclosed by the Commission appear incomplete and internally inconsistent.

The issue becomes even more significant because the revised Bihar electoral roll was not merely a provisional administrative exercise. It became the basis for the conduct of the Bihar Legislative Assembly elections held in November 2025, with the results declared on November 14, 2025. Specifically put, is a state election, where as many as 47 lakh (4.7 million) voters did not cast their franchise because they were not given a chance to prove their electoral status, legitimate in the eyes of the Law, Courts and Constitution?

Consequently, the constitutional questions raised before the Supreme Court were not being examined in an abstract or prospective setting; they concerned an electoral framework that had already been implemented and utilised for a completed democratic exercise. The Court’s eventual decision therefore validated not merely the legal authority to undertake a SIR but also the inefficient and partisan exercise, multiple breaches of the law of the land on the matter concerned, with practical consequences flowing from that exercise.

Yet the larger constitutional concern remains unresolved. The Election Commission consistently maintained that the purpose of the SIR was to ensure that every eligible citizen was included in the electoral roll while simultaneously removing ineligible, duplicate, shifted or deceased voters. However, the public discourse and the statistical outcomes reveal that the exercise was perceived primarily through the lens of deletion rather than inclusion. The overwhelming –and heavily partisan and unaccountable–administrative focus appeared to be directed towards verifying existing entries and identifying names for exclusion. There was comparatively less emphasis on institutional mechanisms designed to assist vulnerable citizens in retaining their electoral status or navigating documentation requirements. For many petitioners and civil society organisations, the concern was not merely the removal of ineligible names but the possibility that genuine electors could be excluded because of absence of access–procedural, technical or documentation-related difficulties. As such the exercise was the reversion of the implementation of both the letter and spirit of election law, the principle behind which is inclusion. SIR 2025-2026 has made this into an exercise of exclusion: disempowering the marginalised in the name of purifying the rolls.

It is this broader context that explains why the challenge to the Bihar SIR generated such intense public debate. The controversy was not only confined to the Election Commission’s authority to revise electoral rolls. Rather, it concerned the manner in which that authority was exercised, the scale of deletions that followed, the burden imposed upon existing electors to re-establish their eligibility, and the absence of complete public clarity regarding the final numerical outcomes.

Even after the Supreme Court’s judgment of May 27 upholding the legality of the SIR framework, these factual and statistical questions remain largely unanswered. The Court resolved the narrow, legal issue of constitutional powers; it did not fully address the concerns arising from the moral, constitutional and real-life consequences of an exercise that ultimately resulted in the deletion of more than 5.18 crore (51.8 million) electors across the country and left significant discrepancies in the publicly available electoral data. In a democracy founded upon universal adult franchise, those questions are not peripheral. They fundamentally point to the relationship between electoral integrity and electoral inclusion, the right to Universal Adult Franchise, integral to a living, participatory Democracy. On grounds of ‘prevention of illegible voters/voting’, the fundamental and key constitutional question of not ever disallowing any eligible voter from his Right to Vote has been consciously blurred if not obliterated.

Contradictory position on citizenship and deleted voters

One of the most significant aspects of the judgment lies in the Court’s treatment of citizenship-related scrutiny undertaken during the SIR exercise.

In paragraph 186(f) of the judgement, the Court held that the Election Commission is empowered to undertake only a limited enquiry into citizenship for the purpose of satisfying itself regarding eligibility for inclusion in the electoral roll. The Court expressly clarified that such an enquiry does not amount to a determination of citizenship in the strict legal sense and that any action taken pursuant to such an exercise is confined exclusively to electoral consequences. According to the Court, the consequence of such a determination is correspondingly limited. It affects an individual’s entitlement to remain on the electoral roll and consequently their participation in the electoral process, but it does not divest the individual of citizenship nor foreclose adjudication by the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955. The Court has, in its own wisdom, through a misconceived verdict, now evolved two types of citizenship one for the qualification of being an elector and another for all purposes. The Court has also not answered the natural and logical question which is, how can a person, adjudged as not a citizen for being elector, be a citizen for all other purposes?!! Further, the Court has not answered the question as to which law allows any executive authority to divest of the rights of a citizen without any final adjudication of the issue. It has opened a Pandora’s Box.

However, the subsequent directions appear to create a degree of tension with this formulation.

In paragraph 186 (g), the Court directed that where the Commission is not satisfied that a person fulfils the statutory conditions for inclusion in the electoral roll, it would be incumbent upon the Commission to refer such an individual to the competent authority within the Central Government for adjudication in accordance with law. The Court further clarified that any deletion effected on this ground shall remain subject to the outcome of such adjudication. Strange without final adjudication as to whether one is a citizen or not the court has given a right to the executive to snatch the supreme democratic right—the right to vote– of a person.

If this is genuinely so, and the Commission possesses neither the authority nor the required expertise/wherewithal to determine citizenship, can or should elections be conducted before final and thorough adjudication of all those excluded, given the hastily conducted SIR that excludes staggering numbers of Voters/Electors?

Without linking the final adjudication process under a badly conducted SIR to actual future conduct of elections, the Court has lent its approval to a basically incomplete and flawed process. Besides, the practical consequence of this direction is significant. Although the Court repeatedly emphasises that the Commission itself does not determine citizenship, the Commission’s dissatisfaction regarding a person’s eligibility may nevertheless become the trigger for a formal citizenship adjudication before another authority. Consequently, while the Election Commission may not be exercising citizenship jurisdiction in the strict legal sense, its findings can initiate a process that ultimately culminates in a determination of citizenship status. Every Indian citizen has a right to be an elector/voter, but the court has not laid down any parameters and duties for the Commission to exercise (process to follow) to adjudge some is not a citizen: the court has made grant or seizure of Indian citizenship by the ECI into an arbitrary act and one that can be exercised for a particular purpose at the whims of the executive. The court has not even examined the stark arbitrariness of the documents enlisted by the commission without sanction of the legislature for the purpose of determination. As per existing law, the enumerated documents (for the SIR) are not and cannot be said to be the proof of citizenship by any means. At most, or best, only the Passport issued by Indian Government can be said to pass this test. The Court has failed to appreciate that the Commission is not equipped in any manner to carry out the inquiry required for determination of citizenship even for a limited purpose (determining a voter).

The issue becomes even more pronounced in paragraph 186(h), where the Court specifically directed that all cases involving persons whose names had been deleted from the 2003 electoral roll on the basis of the Commission’s opinion that they were not citizens must be referred within four weeks to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955. The competent authority was directed to decide such matters after providing notice and an opportunity of hearing and, preferably, before the next Parliamentary, Assembly or Local Body election, whichever occurs earlier.

The Court further directed that if the competent authority ultimately concludes that the deleted individuals are citizens, their names shall be restored to the electoral roll. When and if that happens, what of the Denied Right to Vote in all previous elections until the process is completed/conducted?

Significantly, however, the judgment remains silent on the converse situation.

The directions clearly prescribe the consequences where the competent authority determines that the individual is a citizen. Restoration to the electoral roll follows as a matter of course. However, the judgment does not elaborate upon the legal consequences that would follow if the competent authority were to hold that the individual is not a citizen. The judgment neither identifies the statutory mechanism governing such a situation nor discusses the broader legal implications arising from such a finding.

The judgment therefore resolves the question of institutional competence but leaves unresolved the apprehension reflected in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) notification dated June 24, 2025. The notification provides that where the Election Registration Officer (ERO) or Assistant Election Registration Officer (AERO) entertains doubts regarding the eligibility of a proposed elector—whether due to non-submission of requisite documents or otherwise—a suo motu inquiry may be initiated, followed by the issuance of notice requiring the individual to show cause as to why his or her name should not be deleted from the electoral roll. Upon completion of field verification and examination of documentary material, the ERO/AERO is empowered to decide upon inclusion in the final electoral roll and is required to pass a reasoned speaking order in each case. Significantly, the notification further directs EROs to refer cases involving suspected foreign nationals to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955, while authorising AEROs to independently exercise the powers of the ERO under Section 13C(2) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950. Consequently, although the Court has affirmed that the Election Commission’s enquiry does not amount to a determination of citizenship, concerns persist regarding the practical operation of a framework in which electoral scrutiny may, in certain cases, culminate in processes closely connected with questions of citizenship status.

Lal Babu Hussein and the presumption of validity of existing electoral registration

A central plank of the challenge to the SIR exercise was the Supreme Court’s earlier decision in Lal Babu Hussein and Others v. Electoral Registration Officer, (1995) 3 SCC 100. In Lal Babu Hussein, the Court was dealing with disputes relating to electoral registration in which questions of citizenship directly arose. Recognising the serious consequences associated with exclusion from electoral rolls, the Court laid considerable emphasis on procedural fairness, adherence to natural justice and independent application of mind by electoral authorities.

The Court directed that the officer conducting the enquiry must entertain all forms of evidence, documentary or otherwise, that the affected person seeks to produce. The affected individual must be afforded a meaningful opportunity to rebut any material relied upon against them. The enquiry was characterised as quasi-judicial in nature, requiring fairness, objectivity and reasoned decision-making. The Court further directed that election authorities must consider the provisions of the Constitution, the Citizenship Act and all related legal provisions before arriving at a conclusion. It also quashed restrictions imposed by the Election Commission on the consideration of certain documents and emphasised that evidentiary value must be assessed on a case-by-case basis. Most importantly, the Court underscored that authorities must conduct themselves in a manner consistent with natural justice and free from preconceived notions.

The significance of Lal Babu Hussein lies not merely in its procedural safeguards but in its recognition that inclusion in an electoral roll carries a presumption of validity. The petitioners challenging the Bihar SIR relied heavily upon this principle. Their contention was that once a citizen has already been included in the electoral roll through a legally recognised process, the burden should not casually shift onto that individual to once again establish eligibility through a fresh and intensive verification exercise.

The Supreme Court, however, distinguished Lal Babu Hussein from the Bihar SIR.

According to the Court, Lal Babu Hussein was decided in the context of individual adjudicatory proceedings concerning specific disputes, whereas the Bihar SIR constituted a systemic and inquisitorial exercise undertaken across the electorate in furtherance of the Commission’s constitutional mandate. Consequently, the Court held that while inclusion in the electoral roll undoubtedly gives rise to a presumption of validity, such presumption remains rebuttable and cannot operate as a blanket embargo upon the Commission’s authority to undertake a Special Intensive Revision.

This distinction forms a critical component of the judgment. However, it simultaneously raises a broader constitutional question. If inclusion in an electoral roll generates a presumption of validity, what practical protection does that presumption provide when millions of electors are subjected to fresh verification through a statewide exercise? While the Court recognises the existence of the presumption, the judgment substantially limits its practical effect by permitting large-scale re-examination of already enrolled electors.

Citizenship by presumption, not by documents: the unresolved core of the SIR debate

One of the most significant yet insufficiently examined aspects of the Bihar SIR litigation concerns the nature of citizenship verification itself. Throughout the proceedings, the Election Commission justified the exercise on the ground that electoral rolls must contain only eligible citizens, while the Supreme Court ultimately held that the Commission is empowered to undertake a limited enquiry into citizenship for electoral purposes.

However, the larger difficulty lies in the fact that Indian citizenship law does not prescribe a single, universally accepted document that conclusively establishes citizenship in every circumstance. Unlike identity verification, which may be undertaken through documents such as Aadhaar, citizenship is ordinarily established through a combination of statutory presumptions, factual circumstances, birth records, lineage, residence histories and legal provisions contained in the Citizenship Act, 1955. Consequently, the entire SIR exercise appears to have proceeded on a presumption of citizenship rather than on the basis of any definitive citizenship document recognised uniformly by the competent authority that is the Home Ministry or any document prescribed by any law made under the Citizenship Act. Under these circumstances, the selection or enumeration of such documents becomes not only arbitrary but also whimsical and discriminatory, a procedure that can lead to anarchy.

This becomes evident from the categories of documents accepted during the SIR process. Aadhaar, for instance, is fundamentally a document of identity and residence; it is not a proof of citizenship. Similarly, documents such as ration cards, bank passbooks, school certificates, board examination certificates, property records or welfare-related documents may establish the existence, residence or identity of an individual during a particular period, but none of them independently constitute proof of Indian citizenship. Even birth certificates, which are often treated as foundational documents, do not by themselves establish citizenship in every case, particularly because citizenship by birth in India is governed by different statutory conditions depending upon the date of birth and the status of parents under the Citizenship Act. In that sense, the controversy surrounding SIR was never merely about the production of documents but it was about the legal assumption that citizenship could be inferred through a documentation framework despite the absence of any statutory provision prescribing a definitive citizenship document.

A departure from established electoral practice

The controversy is further accentuated by the fact that the SIR exercise marked a substantial departure from the traditional process of electoral roll maintenance. Historically, electoral registration in India has operated on the basis that inclusion in an existing electoral roll carries a presumption of validity unless specific grounds for deletion are established through the procedure prescribed under the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960. The Supreme Court itself acknowledged this principle by recognising that inclusion in the electoral roll creates a presumption of validity, though one that is rebuttable. Yet the SIR framework effectively required millions of already enrolled electors to re-establish their eligibility through fresh documentation and verification procedures.

The contrast with earlier exercises becomes particularly relevant in light of the experience of Assam. The National Register of Citizens (NRC) process in Assam was conducted under a unique statutory and historical framework, involving specific legacy documents, electoral roll references dating back to 1951 and a legal architecture shaped by the Assam Accord. The documents accepted in the NRC process were tailored to that specific context. By contrast, the Bihar SIR exercise adopted a different framework altogether, while simultaneously rejecting reliance upon certain forms of prior electoral inclusion that had historically been treated as relevant indicators of eligibility.

Foreigners’ tribunals and the limits of analogy

Pertinently, comparisons were frequently drawn with the Foreigners Tribunals functioning in Assam. However, such analogies are not straightforward. The Foreigners Tribunal system emerged from a distinct historical and statutory context linked to immigration concerns in Assam and derives authority from specialised legal provisions applicable in that region. There is presently no equivalent nationwide mechanism automatically applicable to citizenship disputes arising from electoral revision exercises in other States.

Consequently, while the Court’s directions contemplate referral to a competent authority, they do not identify whether any existing institutional structure is capable of handling such disputes on a large scale. Nor do they explain how citizenship determinations are expected to be completed within the timeframe contemplated by paragraph 186(h), particularly when citizenship questions often involve complex inquiries into birth, descent, migration, residence and statutory status extending across decades.

The missing context behind the Bihar SIR

Any assessment of the Supreme Court’s verdict must necessarily be situated within the broader actual, on-ground, reality/factual context in which the Bihar SIR was conceived and implemented. According to the Commission, the exercise was intended to ensure that every eligible citizen was enrolled, no ineligible voter remained on the rolls and entries relating to deceased, shifted or duplicate electors were removed.

The notification stated that the Commission would scrupulously adhere to the constitutional and statutory framework governing electoral eligibility, particularly Article 326 of the Constitution and Section 16 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950. Article 326 guarantees elections based upon adult suffrage, while Section 16 identifies circumstances under which an individual may be disqualified from registration as an elector, including non-citizenship, unsoundness of mind and disqualification arising from electoral offences.

The Commission invoked Article 324 of the Constitution and Section 21 of the Representation of the People Act as the source of its authority. It further stated that the exercise represented the first intensive revision of Bihar’s electoral rolls since 2003 and was necessary to preserve the integrity of electoral rolls in light of rapid urbanisation, migration, demographic changes, underreporting of deaths and concerns regarding the presence of foreign nationals.

To implement the exercise, Booth Level Officers were directed to conduct extensive house-to-house verification. Existing electors were required to complete Enumeration Forms and provide supporting documents. Electoral Registration Officers and Assistant Electoral Registration Officers were entrusted with processing claims and objections before final publication of the revised rolls.

Although the stated objective was to ensure inclusion of all eligible voters, the implementation of the exercise generated widespread concerns from civil society organisations, political parties and election law scholars. Critics questioned the compressed timeline, the documentary requirements and the practical feasibility of requiring millions of electors to complete the process within a matter of weeks. These concerns ultimately formed the foundation of the constitutional challenge that reached the Supreme Court.

The significance of this background cannot be understated. The legal controversy surrounding the Bihar SIR did not arise merely because a revision of electoral rolls was undertaken. It arose because the revision was conducted through an extraordinary and unprecedented methodology that fundamentally altered the manner in which existing electors were required to establish their continued presence on the electoral roll.

Finally, to conclude, the factual position is this: the Commission by conducting such an ill-conceived SIR is acting in breach of the Representation of Peoples Act 1950, 1951, the Registration of Electors Rules 1960, the established practices of the past seven decades; actions that have converted the ongoing exercise into coercive and arbitrary act that is instrumental in killing the fundamentals of our democracy.

The full judgement dated May 27, 2026 can be read here.

Related

SC greenlights SIR, upholds ECI’s power to revise electoral rolls

“Inside the SIR”: Booklet flags ‘mechanical disenfranchisement’ in electoral roll revision

VFD’s rebuttal of the Fadnavis’ Claims on Electoral Manipulation Allegations

The post Judgement delivered, paradox prevails: every voter a citizen, but what is the fate of 51.8 million excluded? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The judgment clarifies that the commission possesses the explicit authority to carry out a Special Intensive Revision under Article 324 of the Constitution, read in conjunction with the relevant provisions of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and the associated regulatory rules.

The legal dispute originated from a series of writ petitions led by Association for Democratic Reforms and Others versus Election Commission of India, filed under Writ Petition (Civil) No. 640 of 2025. The petitioners challenged an administrative notification issued by the commission in June of the preceding year, which authorised a state-wide Special Intensive Revision across the State of Bihar. The petitioners argued that the revision framework resulted in arbitrary mass exclusions and operated as an unconstitutional verification process. However, the Supreme Court rejected these contentions, ruling that the documentation rules and the deletion protocols implemented during the revision were compliant with statutory safeguards and did not violate constitutional principles.

The historical and philosophical framework of the electoral roll

In the text of the judgment, Chief Justice Surya Kant examined the historical development of public membership and democratic franchise within the Indian sub-continent to contextualise the current statutory framework. The court observed that the establishment of an accurate and verifiable record of eligible electors is a structural prerequisite for any representative government before votes can be cast or counted. The electoral roll functions as the legal definition of the political community, meaning its composition directly influences the integrity, accuracy, and credibility of the entire democratic architecture.

The judgment traced the evolution of collective governance mechanisms back to ancient historical records, referencing the administrative and social structures of Bihar during the era of the Mahajanapadas in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE. The court noted that while certain neighbouring territories such as Magadha and Anga operated under monarchical systems, the Vajji confederacy, centred at Vaishali, maintained a system of republican and quasi-republican institutions. Relying on primary historical records, including the Mahaparinibbāna Sutta, the court highlighted that the Vajjis regularised governance through frequent public assemblies, conducted their administrative affairs in institutional concord, and adhered to established customary rules. While these ancient systems did not employ modern methods of adult franchise or formalised voter registries, they established early historical precedents for defining public membership and maintaining structured processes for community deliberation.

The formal statutory formalisation of the electoral registry in modern Indian history emerged under the British colonial administration through the enactment of the Government of India Act, 1935. The Sixth Schedule of the 1935 Act introduced a structured legal system for preparing and revising electoral rolls across defined territorial constituencies based on a specific qualifying date. Although the colonial model enforced an exclusionary franchise restricted by property ownership, educational qualifications, and separate communal electorates, it standardised the administrative transition of voter registration into a formalised statutory regime.

The adoption of the Constitution of India established a complete break from the colonial administrative model. The Constituent Assembly debates held on June 15 and June 16, 1949, regarding Draft Article 289—which was subsequently enacted as Articles 324, 325, and 326—demonstrate that the framers intended to insulate the election machinery entirely from executive interference. The assembly implemented a single, general electoral roll for every territorial constituency, abolished communal electorates, and established universal adult franchise. Under Part XV of the Constitution, the electoral roll was transformed into an instrument of universal political participation, placed under the superintendence, direction, and control of an independent constitutional authority.

Background

The immediate factual basis for the litigation arose on June 24, 2025, when the Election Commission of India issued an order mandating a state-wide Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls across all Assembly constituencies in Bihar. In its recorded statement of reasons, the commission noted that the last intensive house-to-house revision in Bihar had been executed twenty-two years prior, in 2003. In the intervening period, the state’s electoral lists had been updated exclusively through annual summary revisions. The commission determined that this prolonged interval, combined with rapid urbanisation, intra-state and inter-state migration, and unreported voter deaths, had introduced significant duplications, omissions, and inaccuracies into the existing registries.

The administrative framework established by the commission for the execution of the Special Intensive Revision included several specific components that became the primary subjects of the legal challenge. The commission designated the electoral roll compiled during the 2003 intensive revision as the baseline probative evidence for verifying residency and eligibility. Individuals currently residing in Bihar whose names were absent from the 2003 baseline roll were required to provide prescribed government documentation to confirm their status as eligible electors. The commission deployed Booth Level Officers to conduct house-to-house physical visits to distribute a standardised Enumeration Form, which electors were required to complete and submit within a specified timeframe. The administrative directive noted that failure to submit the form would result in exclusion from the initial draft electoral roll.

Upon the publication of the draft electoral roll-on August 1, 2025, the registry showed a significant mathematical decrease. Prior to the initiation of the drive, the total number of registered electors in Bihar stood at approximately 7.89 crore. The published draft roll recorded 7.24 crore electors, clearly pointing to the fact that nearly 65 lakh individuals had been omitted at the draft stage due to the non-submission or non-collection of the Enumeration Forms. This large-scale omission led to immediate legal challenges under Article 32 of the Constitution by the Association for Democratic Reforms, political activist Yogendra Yadav, and members of Parliament including Mahua Moitra, Manoj Jha, KC Venugopal, and Supriya Sule, who asserted that the procedure was structurally flawed and lacked clear statutory authorisation.

Chronology of interim judicial orders and safeguards

The Supreme Court did not stay the ongoing administrative process but instead issued a series of interim directions during July, August, and September 2025 to introduce procedural safeguards and maintain maximum inclusivity during the revision drive. In its initial order dated July 10, 2025, the court framed three core inquiries regarding the statutory basis of the drive, the specific methods used to verify eligibility, and the administrative appropriateness of the timing given the upcoming late 2025 Bihar Legislative Assembly elections. To prevent unintended exclusions, the court ordered the commission to expand its list of acceptable documents to include Aadhaar Cards, Electors Photo Identity Cards, and Ration Cards as valid proof of identity and residence.

Following the disclosure that 65 lakh individuals were absent from the draft roll, the apex court issued an order on August 14, 2025, directing the commission to compile and publicly publish the complete list of omitted names along with the specific technical or clerical reasons for each omission. The court mandated that this list be given wide publicity through print newspapers, television channels, and radio broadcasts to ensure that affected individuals could file rectification claims. To ensure field-level assistance, the court’s order dated August 22, 2025, impleaded twelve recognised national and state political parties as respondents, directing them to utilise their Booth Level Agents to canvas local areas and assist omitted individuals in navigating the claims process.

On September 1, 2025, the court recorded a formal clarification from the commission that the claims, objections, and corrections window would remain functional continuously until the final date for filing election nominations. The court also directed the Chairman of the Bihar State Legal Services Authority to deploy para-legal volunteers across all District Legal Services Authorities to provide free technological and legal assistance to individuals filing claims. In a subsequent order on September 8, 2025, the court defined the evidentiary status of the Aadhaar Card within the revision framework. The court observed that while an Aadhaar Card does not constitute proof of citizenship under the Aadhaar Act, 2016, Section 23(4) of the Representation of the People Act expressly authorises its use for establishing a voter’s identity. The court formally designated the Aadhaar Card as an additional acceptable document for electoral roll verification, while reserving the right of registration officials to seek secondary verification if the genuineness of a claim was in doubt.

The commission issued an official press release on September 30, 2025, marking the final conclusion of the Special Intensive Revision drive in Bihar. The final data revealed that from the 7.24 crore draft roll base, 3.66 lakh names were permanently removed following detailed statutory verification, while 21.53 lakh eligible electors (Form 6) were successfully added through the claims and objections mechanism. (Note: Form 6 is a procedural form available to first-time voters and those who have shifted from their original locations where they were registered as electors to a new address)

The addition of 21.53 lakh electors through the Form 6 procedure only partially explains the reduction from the pre-revision figure of 7.89 crore electors to the finalised roll of 7.42 crore. Even after accounting for 3.66 lakh deletions and 21.53 lakh additions (total movement: 25.19 lakh voters/electors), an unexplained variance of approximately 21.81 lakh electors still remains. Therefore, the figures disclosed do not mathematically reconcile with the final electoral database. It is necessary to specifically question and seek clarification regarding this substantial unexplained gap, as the published data presently appears internally inconsistent and incomplete.

This revised roll with 7.42 Crore electors was subsequently utilised to conduct the Bihar Legislative Assembly elections in November 2025, with the final results declared on November 14, 2025, after which the Supreme Court proceeded to resolve the outstanding constitutional questions.

(Editor’s Note: While this piece, reports on the May 27 judgement of the SC, we shall soon be carrying subsequent pieces, bringing back to our readers, the procedural flaws, inconsistencies and other lapses in the Bihar 2025 SIR process, so that the judicial adjudication does not wipe out the widespread inconsistencies in procedure and law that the Election Commission of India indulged in)

Meanwhile readers may refer and read to the articles related to the Vote for Democracy’s report on the Bihar SIR here, and here.

The actual VFD Bihar Elections 2025 report may be accessed here.

Constitutional and statutory arguments of the petitioners

The petitioners, represented by a panel of senior counsel including Kapil Sibal, Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Gopal Sankaranarayanan, Prashant Bhushan, and Vrinda Grover, mounted a broad constitutional challenge against the validity of the Special Intensive Revision. Their primary argument was that the exercise altered the statutory framework of electoral roll maintenance by turning the commission into a de facto citizenship adjudicator. They contended that existing electoral registration laws do not empower the commission to compel individuals who are already registered on the rolls to newly re-establish their citizenship through fresh documentary proof. Questions regarding nationality, they argued, must be addressed exclusively through the mechanisms provided under the Citizenship Act, 1955, rather than an electoral enumeration drive.

The petitioners characterised the Special Intensive Revision as an NRC-like exercise, asserting that it inverted established legal principles by creating a presumption of ineligibility and shifting the entire evidentiary burden onto individual voters. Counsel argued that the process created a state of suspended citizenship, wherein individuals excluded from the draft roll were effectively deprived of core democratic participation rights prior to any formal adjudication of their legal status by a competent statutory authority. They also challenged the statutory basis of the verification forms, arguing that the specific enumeration forms distributed by the commission lacked explicit backing under the Representation of the People Act, 1950, or the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960.

Regarding the geographic scope of the commission’s powers, the petitioners argued that Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, does not authorise a simultaneous, state-wide or multi-state intensive revision drive. They highlighted that the text of the provision explicitly allows for a special revision for “any constituency or part of a constituency,” which they interpreted as a requirement for targeted, localised, and exceptional interventions rather than broad, state-wide programs. They further argued that the commission had failed to disclose specific, localised data justifying the revision for each individual constituency, rendering the exercise arbitrary. Finally, the petitioners relied on Lal Babu Hussein v. Electoral Registration Officer, (1995) 3 SCC 100, arguing that prior inclusion in an electoral registry creates a legal presumption of eligibility that cannot be set aside without an individualised objection and a specific burden of proof placed on the objector.

Distinguishing factors and rationale for departure

The judgment distinguishes the application of the seminal Lal Babu Hussain Judgement precedent based on the following factual and structural differences:

• Adjudicatory vs. inquisitorial framework: The rules in Lal Babu Hussain were formulated to govern localised, individual deletion proceedings where specific names were singled out based on “selective objections.” In contrast, according to the SC in the present judgement, a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) under Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, is a systemic, inquisitorial house-to-house enumeration applied uniformly to the entire electorate.
• Temporal decay of the presumption: The presumption of regularity under Section 114(e) relies on the notion of periodic accuracy of data. Where an entire state’s rolls have been carried forward exclusively through summary revisions for over two decades (since 2003 in Bihar) without a physical house-to-house audit, the empirical accuracy of the entries in the 2025 SIR under present adjudication, diminishes due to migration, demographic shifts, and unreported deaths.
• The nature of the requirement: Demanding that existing electors provide basic identity tokens or complete enumeration forms during a universal statewide audit does not alter the ultimate burden of proof or negate the presumption of validity; it operates as an administrative verification mechanism under Article 324 rather than an individual citizenship trial.

The contention that the evidentiary presumption identified in Lal Babu Hussain creates a permanent bar against a comprehensive administrative revision conflates a rebuttable procedural rule with a rule of substantive law. An entry in a published electoral roll provides an administrative checkpoint against arbitrary, selective deletions; it does not divest the Election Commission of its constitutional authority to verify database accuracy under Article 324.

Because the rules in Lal Babu Hussain were developed within the context of localised adjudicatory proceedings where individual entries were targeted without prior disclosure of the material basis, they cannot be expanded to invalidate a state-wide, inquisitorial policy exercise executed under Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950. In the SC’s present understanding and analysis, applying an individualised dispute framework to a systemic overhaul fails to recognise the legal distinction between a localised objection and a uniform administrative response to macro-demographic inaccuracies.

Furthermore, the legal weight of an administrative presumption under Section 114(e) of the Indian Evidence Act is operationally dependent on temporal proximity to physical verification. The factual matrix of Lal Babu Hussain involved a statutory regime where intensive house-to-house revisions were conducted at regular intervals, ensuring that entries carried forward reflected contemporary data. Where the electoral data has been modified solely via summary revisions for more than twenty years without a physical audit, the factual foundation sustaining the presumption undergoes structural decay. Requiring the Commission to establish individualised doubts prior to conducting a universal verification would reduce the statutory mechanism of intensive revisions to a dead letter. Systemic verification does not reverse the burden of proof regarding citizenship, but rather satisfies the contemporary administrative criteria required for electoral representation.

The invocation of the dictum in Lal Babu Hussain to erect an unyielding procedural embargo against a comprehensive administrative revision proceeds on an erroneous conflation of a rebuttable evidentiary presumption with an immutable rule of substantive law. While an existing entry in a published roll generates a presumption of regularity under Section 114 of the Evidence Act, such an administrative tool cannot paralyse the Election Commission’s plenary constitutional obligations under Article 324 to safeguard the integrity of the political community. The protective principles established in Lal Babu Hussain were designed within a narrow matrix of individual adjudicatory proceedings where specific voters were selectively targeted without due process. They cannot be stretched to obstruct a state-wide inquisitorial policy exercise directed at restoring the comprehensive structural accuracy of an electorate whose data has languished without house-to-house verification for over two decades.

While these are the lofty presumptions used by the SC to justify the 2025 SIR, there is no reference nor detailing in the present judgement of the huge laps and gaps of operational conduct by the ECI in making available forms to electors/voters, in giving an adequate time-frame for data collection, in making these processes transport etc. In fact, during the hearings initially, the SC had “promised” to step in if there were “mass deletions.” In the end the Bihar elections 2025 were conducted with no course correction.

Read our reports here, here and here.

Statutory defence and arguments of the commission

The ECI, represented by Senior Advocates Rakesh Dwivedi, Maninder Singh, and Dama Seshadri Naidu, defended the statutory validity of the drive by arguing that the petitioners had mischaracterised the nature and scope of the Special Intensive Revision. The commission’s primary defence was that the exercise did not constitute a formal nationality adjudication under deportation or citizenship laws. Instead, it was an electoral verification process aimed solely at ensuring that only eligible individuals remained on the voter registries. The commission emphasised that because the Constitution establishes a citizen-based franchise under Article 326, it is under a continuous constitutional obligation to maintain the purity of the rolls by removing ineligible entries.

The commission rejected the comparison to an NRC-style process, describing the Special Intensive Revision as a flexible, administrative verification model managed by civil election officials rather than an investigation conducted by police authorities. Addressing the petitioners’ reliance on Lal Babu Hussein, the commission argued that the precedent was factually distinguishable. It noted that the earlier case involved police involvement in the verification drive and lacked clear administrative safeguards, whereas the present drive was conducted entirely by election personnel and incorporated multiple layers of procedural review. The commission also maintained that prior inclusion on the rolls was not ignored and continued to serve as a piece of baseline evidence during the verification process.

The commission further argued that its authority under the statutory scheme is fully supported by the text of Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950. It contended that the statutory power to conduct a special revision necessarily includes the authority to perform intensive verification when required to preserve the integrity of the electoral process. The commission rejected assertions of external motivation, stating that its actions were strictly guided by its institutional mandate to correct long-standing demographic inaccuracies in registries that had not undergone an intensive review for over two decades.

Judicial interpretation of Articles 324 and 327

The Supreme Court analysed the structural relationship between the plenary constitutional authority of the commission under Article 324 and the legislative powers of Parliament under Article 327. The court rejected the petitioners’ submission that the enactment of detailed statutory laws by Parliament entirely removes the independent regulatory authority of the commission. The bench held that Articles 324 and 327 are complementary provisions that must be interpreted in harmony with one another. While Parliament is empowered to enact laws governing the conduct and administration of elections, such statutes cannot be applied in a manner that strips the commission of its core constitutional obligation to ensure the integrity of the electoral process.

The court re-examined the legal principles established in Mohinder Singh Gill v. Chief Election Commissioner, (1978) 1 SCC 405, noting that while the commission must conform to valid legislative enactments and cannot act in direct contradiction to an express statutory prohibition, Article 324 functions as a continuous reservoir of power. This power enables the commission to issue regulatory directives to address administrative gaps where the statutory law is silent or insufficient to meet operational contingencies. The bench emphasised that the terms “superintendence, direction, and control” must be interpreted broadly to fulfil their constitutional purpose. The judgment delivered by Chief Justice Surya Kant held:

“When the statute itself authorises a special revision at any time, for reasons to be recorded and in such manner as the Election Commission may deem fit, the impugned exercise cannot be invalidated merely because it does not conform in every respect to the ordinary modalities contemplated for routine revision. In our considered opinion, the impugned SIR does not supplant the Representation of the People Act and the Rules. Rather, it breathes life into the constitutional mandate under Article 324 within the precise statutory contours provided by Section 21(3). Therefore, it cannot be said that the Commission has acted in excess of its statutory powers.”

Factual harmonisation with Section 21(3) and Rule 21A

The court proceeded to analyse the specific text of Section 21 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, to determine if the Special Intensive Revision conflicted with statutory mandates. The bench observed that while Section 21(2) outlines the standard, rule-bound annual summary revisions of voter lists, Section 21(3) operates as an independent, enabling provision designed for extraordinary demographic or administrative adjustments. The court emphasised two primary elements of Section 21(3):

• The operation of the non-obstante clause: The inclusion of the phrase “Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (2)” serves to decouple the special revision process from the strict procedural limits and timelines that govern routine summary revisions under Section 21(2) and Rule 25 of the 1960 Rules.

• Procedural discretion: The statutory phrase “in such manner as it may think fit” grants the commission broad administrative latitude to design the operational methods of a special revision based on ground-level exigencies, subject to the condition that it records its reasons in writing.

The bench rejected the petitioners’ strict geographic interpretation of the term “any constituency”. Applying Section 13(2) of the General Clauses Act, 1897—which provides that words in the singular include the plural—and drawing upon the interpretation in Prabhakaran v. P. Jayarajan (2005) 1 SCC 754, the court ruled that the word “any” can mean “all” or “many” depending on the statutory context and purpose. If the administrative reasons justifying an intensive revision apply uniformly across an entire state due to a multi-decade gap in house-to-house verification, the commission is legally authorised to issue a single consolidated order covering all constituencies within that state. The court noted that requiring individual, separate notifications for each constituency would create a fragmented administrative process that hinders the commission’s capability to fulfil its duties.

The judgment also addressed the petitioners’ arguments regarding Rule 21A of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, which details the procedure for deleting names due to death, migration, or disqualification. The court determined that deletions executed during a Special Intensive Revision do not stand in contradiction to Rule 21A. The bench held that because the essential procedural safeguards of notice, public display of draft lists, and the opportunity to file claims and objections remain preserved in substance, the revision framework complies with the core requirements of procedural fairness established by the rules.

Application of the proportionality test and rights balancing

The Supreme Court evaluated the SIR framework under the four prongs of the constitutional test of proportionality to determine whether the administrative measures unjustifiably infringed upon the right to vote under Article 326.

I. Legitimacy of purpose

The court ruled that the commission’s objective—ensuring that electoral registries are accurate, complete, and credible—is rooted in the constitutional mandates of Articles 325 and 326. The grounds for updating the rolls align with the statutory criteria for removal recognised by Parliament, such as voter death, changes in ordinary residence, or supervening disqualifications. Because inaccurate voter lists directly undermine the integrity of the democratic process, the initiation of the purification drive satisfies the requirement of a legitimate public purpose.

II. Rational nexus

The bench found a direct logical connection between the administrative method used and the objective pursued. A physical, house-to-house verification drive combined with standardised enumeration forms is a direct method to identify unrecorded deaths, duplicate entries, and outdated residency data that annual summary updates cannot fully resolve.

III. Necessity and least restrictive means

The petitioners argued that the commission should have utilised narrower, localised audits rather than a state-wide program. In reviewing this choice, the Supreme Court cited the constitutional bench ruling in Vivek Narayan Sharma v. Union of India (2023) 3 SCC 1, which established that evaluating the scale of a systemic administrative issue and choosing an appropriate regulatory response are tasks requiring specialised expertise. The court noted that maintaining accurate registries belongs to the exclusive constitutional mandate of the commission, involving complex logistical and demographic assessments. The judiciary will not substitute its own policy preferences for the methodology chosen by a specialised constitutional body unless that choice is demonstrated to be arbitrary or unguided. Given the pervasive nature of the inaccuracies accumulated over twenty-two years, the selection of a state-wide intensive revision was determined to be a necessary administrative step.

IV. Fair balancing

The court evaluated the balance between the administrative goals of the drive and the protection of individual franchise rights. The bench observed that while the right to vote is a key constitutional right, its operationalisation requires compliance with regulatory verification frameworks to confirm identity and residence. Procedural compliance requirements do not automatically violate the right, provided they are workable and accompanied by adequate remedies. The court noted that while the initial drop of 65 lakh names from the draft roll raised valid questions regarding potential exclusion, the subsequent integration of procedural safeguards—including the expansion of accepted identity documents, the public disclosure of the reasons for omission, and the mobilisation of legal service volunteers—ensured that the drive satisfied the test of proportionality and did not result in systemic disenfranchisement.

Scope of citizenship scrutiny and referral mandate

The Supreme Court addressed the exact boundaries of the commission’s authority regarding questions of citizenship during the compilation of electoral registries. The court rejected the submission that the commission is entirely barred from reviewing queries related to nationality. The bench pointed out that under Section 16 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, non-citizenship functions as an express statutory disqualification from registration. Because the commission is legally required to ensure that only eligible individuals are entered onto the rolls, it possesses the ancillary authority to scrutinise documentation concerning citizenship status at the stage of voter registration. The court held that calling upon electors to furnish supporting materials during a revision drive does not negate the presumption of citizenship recognised in Lal Babu Hussein; rather, it represents the procedural mechanism through which existing qualifications are verified.

However, the judgment drew a clear legal distinction between the administrative findings of the commission and the formal adjudication of nationality under the Citizenship Act, 1955. The bench ruled that an adverse determination by an election officer during a Special Intensive Revision exercise is limited strictly to electoral eligibility. Chief Justice Surya Kant observed:

“Upon detailed consideration, we have come to the conclusion that, in view of the statutory requirement under Section 16 of the Representation of the People Act, the Commission, in the course of preparing or revising electoral rolls, is undoubtedly empowered to examine questions bearing upon citizenship. The consequence of such a citizenship determination is correspondingly limited. It affects the individual’s entitlement to be included in the electoral rolls and thereby the right to participate in the electoral process. It does not, however, operate to divest the individual of claims to citizenship, nor does it foreclose adjudication of that question by the competent authority under the Citizenship Act.”

The court further held that in instances where the commission determines that an individual has not produced sufficient material to satisfy the statutory criteria for inclusion on the rolls, it cannot issue a final or binding conclusion on their nationality. Instead, it is incumbent upon the commission to refer such individuals to the competent authority of the Union Government for formal adjudication in accordance with the law. Because the commission’s findings are confined to electoral purposes, any deletion executed on the grounds of doubtful citizenship remains subject to the final outcome of the adjudication conducted by the competent statutory authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955.

As a specific operational consequence of this referral mandate, the Supreme Court directed the Election Commission of India to forward to the Central Government the names of all persons deleted from the 2003 Bihar electoral rolls over doubtful citizenship. The court mandated that this list be compiled and transmitted to the Union Government within a strict timeframe of four weeks from the date of the judgment. This directive ensures that individuals whose names were removed during the purification drive due to nationality concerns are automatically placed into the appropriate legal channel for a final determination of their citizenship status by the competent central authority.

Current operational status of revisions

The judgment of the Supreme Court provides a sense of finality on the issues raised that is the statutory scope and procedural boundaries of Special Intensive Revisions conducted under Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950. However, given the procedural flaws (and there were many) couples with the statutory gaps, there is no final clarity on the mass disenfranchisement that has been affected in the process.

By simply validating the commission’s authority to initiate state-wide intensive drives and implement standardised documentation frameworks, the court has rendered legitimacy to a faulty and non-transparent administrative mechanism used to update what is being justified as long-standing inaccuracies in voter registries. Concurrently, by limiting the legal consequence of the commission’s findings strictly to electoral eligibility, the judgment prevents the administrative process from functioning as a final determination of nationality, preserving the jurisdiction of specialised authorities under the Citizenship Act, 1955. However, given that this adjudication process under the Citizenship act, 1955 lies with the Home Ministry of a Union Government that has made political exclusion and disenfranchisement part of its stated goals, this offers little succour. What the country is likely to see is the mass distress by documented exclusions caused to vast number of Indians.

Because the Supreme Court did not stay the administrative execution of the revision drive during the pendency of the litigation, the SIR process has already transitioned through its active phases and has been completed in several states, including Bihar, Kerala, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, and West Bengal etc. Following the reservation of the judgment on January 29, 2026, and its formal pronouncement on May 27, 2026, the legal principles established by the bench now govern the ongoing SIR drives currently being carried out by the commission in multiple other states.

The full judgement dated May 27, 2026 may be read here:

Related

“Inside the SIR”: Booklet flags ‘mechanical disenfranchisement’ in electoral roll revision

VFD’s rebuttal of the Fadnavis’ Claims on Electoral Manipulation Allegations

The Bihar Verdict 2025: How an election was engineered before votes were cast

The post SC greenlights SIR, upholds ECI’s power to revise electoral rolls appeared first on SabrangIndia.

According to the official police enquiry, Malabika, a resident of Garia and posted at Diamond Harbour BDO-I, returned home after work on the night of March 29, 2026. She went to bed with her daughter as usual. However, at around 1:00 AM, she suddenly fell critically ill and began vomiting. In a state of distress, she informed her husband, Amalesh Bhattacharyya, who was in another room, that she had consumed poison. The family immediately rushed her to Allied Nursing Home in Boral. As her condition deteriorated, she was shifted to Ruby General Hospital on March 30 for advanced treatment. Despite medical intervention, she succumbed to the effects of poisoning on March 31, 2026, at approximately 8:30 AM.

Family’s account and allegations

The bereaved family has attributed her extreme step to the overwhelming pressure arising from her official responsibilities, particularly those linked to the SIR of electoral rolls.

Her husband has stated that Malabika had been under severe mental strain for several months due to the heavy workload associated with SIR duties. He further alleged that she had recently faced humiliation in connection with her work, which deeply affected her. On the night of the incident, after returning home, she reportedly spoke about the distressing experience. Later, when her condition worsened, she confessed to having consumed pesticide. Despite immediate efforts to save her, her condition continued to decline, ultimately leading to her death. The husband has also raised allegations against the Election Commission, claiming that the work pressure imposed on her was excessive and unmanageable.

Allegations of work-induced stress

The incident has foregrounded serious concerns about work-induced stress among election officials tasked with high-stakes administrative responsibilities.

Family members and relatives have consistently maintained that Malabika was struggling with an unsustainable workload for a prolonged period. According to them, the demands of the SIR process had left her mentally exhausted and overwhelmed. They revealed that she had expressed her inability to cope with the mounting pressure and had even contemplated resigning from her position. Significantly, the official police enquiry also records that she had been “suffering from mental depression for the last few months due to SIR,” thereby lending weight to the family’s assertions.

Police Action and Ongoing Investigation

Following the incident, the Bansdroni Police Station registered an Unnatural Death (UD) case (No. 22/26 dated March 31, 2026) and initiated a detailed investigation into the circumstances surrounding her death.

At present, no formal complaint has been lodged by the family or any other party. However, the police have conducted an inquest and arranged for a post-mortem examination to determine the exact cause of death and to preserve medico-legal evidence. The investigation remains ongoing, and authorities are expected to examine all relevant aspects, including the alleged work-related stress factors.

 A nationwide pattern of electoral fatigue

Tragically, Bhattacharyya’s death is not an isolated incident but part of a grim, nationwide pattern linked to the SIR exercise. Across India, compressed timelines, technical failures, and coercive supervision have pushed grassroots election workers to the brink. In West Bengal alone, Booth Level Officers (BLOs) like Rinku Tarafdar and Shantimoni Ekka took their own lives late last year, explicitly citing unbearable pressure, faulty digital apps, and language barriers.

Similar tragedies have unfolded in Uttar Pradesh, where officials like Sudhir Kumar Kori died by suicide after being denied leave for his own wedding under threat of dismissal. From Gujarat to Kerala—where a BLO’s death triggered a statewide boycott—and Tamil Nadu, workers have succumbed to extreme distress, with some even suffering fatal, stress-induced strokes and heart attacks. These cascading tragedies reveals a systemic crisis, highlighting the urgent need to address the harrowing human cost of rigid administrative mandates.

Related:

SIR exercise leaves trail of suicide across states as BLOs buckle under pressure and citizens panic over citizenship

Pregnant woman deported despite parents on 2002 SIR rolls, another homemaker commits suicide

Haunted by NRC fears, 57-year-old West Bengal man dies by suicide; Mamata blames BJP for turning democracy into a “theatre of fear”

The post AERO dies by suicide in Kolkata, family alleges extreme election duty pressure and humiliation appeared first on SabrangIndia.

This proliferation of violence transcends isolated instances of criminality; rather, it constitutes an orchestrated subversion of secular constitutionalism and a grave abrogation of fundamental human rights.

This legal analytical piece examines these systemic attacks through a rigorous constitutional and statutory framework. The organised marginalisation and physical coercion of these migrant traders strike directly at the Fundamental Rights guaranteed under Part III of the Constitution of India. Specifically, these acts constitute blatant violations of the right to equality before the law and the equal protection of the laws under Article 14. They not only result in severe violations of Fundamental Rights under Articles 14, 15, 19 and 21, the report further evaluates criminal liabilities under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, and the systemic failure of law enforcement to uphold statutory duties under State Police Acts.

The targeted hostility and denial of commercial access based strictly on regional and religious identity directly infringe upon the constitutional protections against discrimination enshrined in Article 15(2) (b). The forced displacement, threats of violence, and destruction of inventory fundamentally contravene the freedoms guaranteed to all citizens, explicitly violating the right to move freely throughout the territory of India under Article 19(1)(d), as well as the absolute right to practise any profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade, or business under Article 19(1)(g). Ultimately, the physical assaults, coercion, and the resulting climate of terror strip these individuals of their paramount right to the protection of life and personal liberty as guaranteed by Article 21, executing deprivations entirely without any procedure established by law.

Furthermore, this report meticulously assesses the criminal liabilities of the vigilante perpetrators under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS), mapping their actions to stringent penal offenses including wrongful restraint, voluntarily causing grievous hurt, criminal intimidation, and the deliberate promotion of enmity between groups.

Crucially, this analysis critiques the concerning state failure and institutional apathy that have permitted this targeted violence to persist with relative impunity. By juxtaposing the ground reality against the explicit statutory mandates of the Uttarakhand Police Act, 2007, and the Punjab Police Act, 2007—which legally obligate law enforcement to impartially protect life, uphold human rights, and proactively maintain communal harmony.

To substantiate the scale and systemic nature of these constitutional and statutory violations, the subsequent sections provide a comprehensive, state-wise documentation of the specific incidents of assault, coercion, and economic displacement perpetrated against Kashmiri vendors.

I. Punjab

Kapurthala: January 18, 2025

On January 18, 2025, a seasonal Kashmiri shawl seller named Mohammad Shafi Khawaja, originating from Kupwara, was physically attacked and looted by three motorcycle-borne masked miscreants while en route to sell shawls in Shahpur Andreta village within the Sultanpur area of Kapurthala district.

“Three masked assailants came on a motorcycle and looted him of Rs 12,000 in cash and also took away his shawls worth Rs 35,000, the police said”, reported The Print.

Strongly condemning the incident, the Jammu and Kashmir Students Association (JKSA) issued a public statement on X (formerly Twitter), stating that “We have taken up the matter of the assault on a Kashmiri shawl seller in Kapurthala, Punjab, with the Punjab Government. The National Convenor of JKSA, @NasirKhuehami, has spoken to Punjab Chief Secretary KAP Sinha, who said that instructions have been issued to the DGP of Punjab to ensure swift action. He directed DGP Punjab, Gaurav Yadav, to identify the criminals and take strict action against those responsible for such a criminal act. He further stated that the culprits will face the consequences they deserve. The safety and security of Kashmiri students and shawl sellers remain our utmost priority.”

We have taken up the matter of the assault on a Kashmiri shawl seller in Kapurthala, Punjab, with the Punjab Government. The National Convenor of JKSA, @NasirKhuehami, has spoken to Punjab Chief Secretary KAP Sinha, who said that instructions have been issued to the DGP of Punjab… https://t.co/eXAM7LGYBf

— J&K Students Association (@JKSTUDENTSASSO) January 19, 2025

Another attack in Kapurthala against Kashmiri shawl seller from Kupwara

By February 11, 2025, in a continuation of violence against migrant traders, Fareed Ahmad Bajad, a Kashmiri shawl seller from Kupwara, was physically assaulted and robbed of his merchandise and cash by unidentified assailants in Kapurthala, Punjab. This incident marks the third such attack on Kashmiri vendors in the state within a 45-day period.

According to the Observer Post, Nasir Khuehami, the national convenor of the J&K Students Association, publicly condemned the recurring assaults as a targeted trend of intimidation threatening the community’s livelihood, local law enforcement provided a different assessment. Kapurthala Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Gaurav Toora confirmed the registration of an FIR at the City Police Station but dismissed allegations of communal intent or hate crimes.

Attributing the assaults to petty criminals and drug addicts targeting high-value merchandise, SSP Toora noted that four individuals had been arrested in connection with the previous cases and advised the vendors to travel in groups for their safety, as reported

II. Uttarakhand

Two Kashmiri vendors allegedly assaulted by Bajrang Dal members in Mussoorie

On April 29, 2025, two Kashmiri shawl vendors were assaulted by local youths (allegedly by Bajrang Dal members) on Mall Road in Mussoorie as claimed “retribution” for a terror attack. A video purportedly showed the vendors being slapped and harassed despite presenting their Aadhaar cards. Consequently, members of the community said “16 have left the town for safety.” Trader Shabir Ahmed Dar reported leaving goods worth Rs 12 lakh.

JKSA intervention, allegations of Police complicity, and subsequent arrests in Mussoorie

Highlighting the severity of the incident, Nasir Khuehami, National Convenor, initially posted on X that two Kashmiri shawl sellers were “brutally assaulted by members of the Bajrang Dal” in Mussoorie and that around 16 other traders from Kupwara district were “threatened, harassed, and forcibly evicted from their rented accommodations.”

Pointing to a severe lapse in civic policing, he noted that instead of receiving state protection, the vendors “were reportedly asked by the Mussoorie Police themselves to vacate the area and leave the state immediately.” Illustrating the economic devastation faced by the seasonal workers, Khuehami shared a statement from an affected trader that “All our goods, worth at least ₹30 lakh, are still lying there. We had no choice but to flee back to Kashmir, leaving everything behind.”

We received deeply disturbing and chilling reports from Mussoorie, Uttarakhand, where two Kashmiri shawl sellers were brutally assaulted by members of the Bajrang Dal. Also, Around 16 other Kashmiri traders, mostly from the Kupwara district, have been threatened, harassed, and… pic.twitter.com/rneqVF8jOR

— Nasir Khuehami (ناصر کہویہامی) (@NasirKhuehami) April 29, 2025

Following appeals to state and national officials, Khuehami later posted an update on X that, “Upon raising the matter, DGP Uttarakhand, Deepam Seth Sahab informed me that the Uttarakhand Police had taken cognizance of the incident involving the assault on Kashmiri shawl vendors by three youths on Mall Road.” He confirmed the arrests of Suraj Singh, Pradeep Singh, and Abhishek Uniyal, noting that “legal proceedings are being initiated against them under the Police Act.” The update concluded by stating that the culprits “apologized for their actions and assured that they would not repeat such behavior,” while confirming the mass exodus that “Around 16 Kashmiri shawl vendors from Mussoorie have now returned to the Kashmir Valley.”

Update from Mussoorie Uttrakhand:

Upon raising the matter, DGP Uttarakhand, Deepam Seth Sahab informed me that the Uttarakhand Police had taken cognizance of the incident involving the assault on Kashmiri shawl vendors by three youths on Mall Road. The incident happened two days… https://t.co/UsfWbKoKOR pic.twitter.com/LpmDEOMz44

— Nasir Khuehami (ناصر کہویہامی) (@NasirKhuehami) April 29, 2025

According to the Times of India, Police arrested three men under section 81 of the Uttarakhand Police Act, who were later fined and released after issuing written apologies. Dehradun SSP Ajay Singh stated, “We identified the assaulters and arrested them… I called them and assured them that they were free to come to Mussoorie and carry out their business.” Contrasting the exodus, local Kashmiri shopkeeper Muhammed Aslam Malik stated, “I am running my shop here since 2019 and have not faced any harassment here,” while Mussoorie Traders Association president Rajat Aggarwal added, “The society of Mussoorie is not aggressive or vindictive” as reported

Kashipur, Udham Singh Nagar

On December 22, 2025, a Kashmiri vendor named Bilal Ahmad Ganie, who had been operating his trade in the region for nine years, was intercepted in Kashipur by a mob of Bajrang Dal members led by local leader Ankur Singh.

According to report, the mob brutally assaulted the vendor, physically twisted his limbs, and coercively forced him to chant “Bharat Mata ki Jai.”

A #Kashmiri man was attacked and threatened in the #UdhamSinghNagar district of #Uttarakhand.

Bilal Ahmad, a shawl seller who has lived and worked in Kashipur for nearly a decade, was reportedly assaulted by a group linked to the #BajrangDal, allegedly led by a local man named… pic.twitter.com/7wTPzIovau

— Hate Detector (@HateDetectors) December 26, 2025

The physical violence was accompanied by xenophobic slurs explicitly questioning his nationality.

Following the circulation of the assault video on December 26, the Home Ministry announced a zero-tolerance directive, which subsequently led to the official arrest of the Bajrang Dal leader on December 27.

17-year-old Kashmiri shawl seller brutally attacked with rods in Vikasnagar, Dehradun

On January 28, 2026, the systemic violence culminated in a near-fatal mob attack in the Vikasnagar area of Dehradun district. A 17-year-old Kashmiri shawl vendor named Tabish Ahmed, along with his younger brother, was intercepted by a local shopkeeper and subsequently attacked by right-wing extremists armed with iron rods. The perpetrators subjected the youths to severe regional profiling, baselessly accusing them of complicity in the Pulwama attacks, before inflicting grievous bodily harm.

The assault left the 17-year-old with a fractured arm and severe head injuries that necessitated intensive medical treatment at Doon Hospital.

Image Courtesy: Greater Kashmir

J&K CM Omar Abdulla urged Uttarakhand CM to take strict action against the perpetrators

Following the assault on a young Kashmiri shawl seller in Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah took up the matter directly with Uttarakhand CM Pushkar Singh Dhami.

According to a X post from the J&K Chief Minister’s Office, stating that “Chief Minister spoke with the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, @pushkardhami, regarding the incident of assault on a young Kashmiri shawl seller in Uttarakhand and urged him to take strict action against the perpetrators. @pushkardhami assured that strict action, including registration of an FIR, would be taken in the matter and safety of J&K residents will be ensured.”

Chief Minister spoke with the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, @pushkardhami, regarding the incident of assault on a young Kashmiri shawl seller in Uttarakhand and urged him to take strict action against the perpetrators.@pushkardhami assured that strict action, including…

— Office of Chief Minister, J&K (@CM_JnK) January 29, 2026

However, Waheed Ur Rehman Para, Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Pulwama representing the J&K Peoples Democratic Party (JKPDP) condemned the targeted attacks against Kashmiri student and traders. He posted on X that, “Amid rising hate crimes against Kashmiri students and traders, @jkpdp moved an adjournment motion today in the J&K Assembly, seeking an end to targeted attacks and discrimination.”

Amid rising hate crimes against Kashmiri students and traders, @jkpdp moved an adjournment motion today in the J&K Assembly, seeking an end to targeted attacks and discrimination. pic.twitter.com/r7zOKuItgW

— Waheed Ur Rehman Para (@parawahid) February 3, 2026

III. Himachal Pradesh

Dehra, Kangra

In November 2025, in the Dehra area of Kangra, a local resident named Naresh Sharma assumed vigilante authority by intercepting two Kashmiri hawkers who had been peacefully residing in Naiharan Pukhra for five to six years. Sharma illegally demanded to see their police verification, arbitrarily searched their commercial bags, and baselessly accused them of suspicious movement, carrying weapons, and child abduction. Despite the hawkers providing their Aadhaar identification, Sharma rejected their legal documents, ordered them to leave the village immediately, and threatened to invoke state authority against them.

Further on December 27, 2025, when a Kashmiri shawl seller was brutally assaulted by local vigilantes in the same Dehra region. The mob inflicted bone fractures and multiple physical injuries upon the vendor, completely vandalised his trade goods, and deliberately smashed his mobile phone to destroy evidentiary material, culminating in threats commanding him to leave the state entirely.

Shimla

On December 13, 2025, the hostility against the vendors was heavily institutionalised during a public gathering in Shimla organised by the Dev Bhoomi Sangharsh Samiti and VHP-Bajrang Dal concerning a local mosque dispute. During the assembly, a speaker openly propagated hate speech and called for an economic boycott of non-Hindus. The speaker specifically targeted Kashmiri hawkers with conspiracy theories, alleging they conduct surveillance on households when women are alone, referred to non-Hindus as modern-day demons, and circulated fabricated stories of hawkers stealing and consuming cattle to incite communal animosity and violence. This violence is illustrative of how this hill state, once peaceful, has been sought to be converted into a communal battlefield.

FIR registered following assault on Kashmiri Shawl seller in Ghumarwin, Bilaspur

An FIR has been registered by the Bilaspur police after a Kashmiri shawl seller was allegedly assaulted and his merchandise destroyed in the Ghumarwin area of the district. The complaint was filed by Abdul Ahad Khan, a resident of Kupwara, who reported being attacked on December 27, 2025 near Kuthera village by three masked individuals. According to Khan, the assailants assaulted him without provocation and destroyed shawls worth Rs. 20,000 before he managed to flee.

Himachal Pradesh has the same problem as Uttarakhand. Hate.
And both proclaim themselves as ‘Devbhoomi’. https://t.co/af0lBhWypI

— Man Aman Singh Chhina (@manaman_chhina) December 29, 2025

Bilaspur Superintendent of Police Sandeep Dhawal confirmed that an FIR has been filed under Sections 126(2), 115(2), and 324(4) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) at the Ghumarwin police station, and efforts are underway to trace the suspects involved, as the Hindustan Times reported

IV. Haryana

Kashmiri shawl seller forced to chant “Bharat Mata Ki Jai” and “Vande Mataram” in Fatehabad

On December 28, 2025, Kashmiri shawl sellers and traders in the Fatehabad area were subjected to severe public intimidation and physical assault based on their religious and regional identities. A widely circulated video documented a local resident physically assaulting a Kashmiri vendor by violently grabbing his collar and subjecting him to degrading treatment.

The perpetrator aggressively forced the youth to chant “Bharat Mata Ki Jai” and “Vande Mataram” in a threatening tone, using public humiliation and the imminent threat of further violence as punishment for the vendor’s initial refusal to participate in the forced majoritarian sloganeering.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by The New Indian Express (@newindianexpress)

Police lodge suo motu FIR for ‘hate speech’ in Kaithal for heckling with Kashmiri vendor

On December 29, 2025, in a separate incident in the Kalayat area of Kaithal district, a viral video showed a local man confronting a Kashmiri vendor who was sitting on a concrete bench. The man demanded the vendor chant “Vande Mataram,” a request the vendor declined while citing his Islamic faith. In response, the assailant referenced violence against Hindus in Bangladesh, forced the vendor to pack up and leave, and threatened to burn him alive while explicitly warning that Muslims should not enter the village.

Taking suo moto cognizance of the video, the Kaithal police registered a First Information Report (FIR) on December 27 under Sections 196(1), 299, and 353(1) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) against unidentified persons.

The incidents drew immediate public condemnation, including from Iltija Mufti, who shared the footage on X (formerly Twitter) and tagged Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini and the Director General of Police to demand accountability.

A Kashmiri shawl vendor is yet again harassed, abused & heckled in Haryana. You abuse & misbehave with Kashmiris & then conveniently dub them as ‘anti nationals’ all in the same breath. Are we sub human? Request @NayabSainiBJP @cmohry @DGPHaryana to take cognisance of this… pic.twitter.com/t3aOqCtHww

— Iltija Mufti (@IltijaMufti_) December 27, 2025

V. Uttar Pradesh

Lucknow

On January 17, 2026, organised vigilante groups extended their campaign of intimidation against Kashmiri street vendors in Lucknow. Deepak Shukla, identified as a VHP-Bajrang Dal leader originating from Uttam Nagar in Delhi, along with his local associates, systematically intercepted and harassed seasonal Kashmiri traders.

Shukla and his group subjected the vendors to religious profiling, coercively forced them to chant “Vande Mataram,” and issued direct ultimatums threatening violence if the vendors did not immediately pack their goods and permanently vacate the geographical area.

Kashmiri artists face housing discrimination ahead of Kanpur Exhibition

On October 24, after a gruelling two-day search for accommodation in Kanpur, a group of young Kashmiri artists operating under the banner “Glance Kashmir” were abruptly evicted from a newly rented flat upon revealing their identity. The group had originally arrived in the city on October 22 to participate in an upcoming art exhibition and sought a modest space where they could cook their own meals.

During their initial search, they encountered blatant prejudice, with one local explicitly stating that rental properties would not even be shown to Muslims and Ahirs. On their third day, the artists finally secured a flat for Rs. 15,000 a month and paid a Rs. 5,000 advance, as reported the Observer Post.

However, when they returned that evening with groceries after setting up their exhibition stall, the landlady inquired about their background and immediately ordered them to leave. Despite the group’s desperate pleas that they were exhausted, hungry, and had nowhere else to stay for the night, she refunded their money and forced them out.

VI. Arunachal Pradesh

Naharlagun, Itanagar

On December 17, 2025, in Naharlagun, Itanagar, the targeting of Kashmiri vendors manifested through regional exclusivity and vigilantism concerning municipal trade licenses. Taro Sonam Liyak, the president of the Arunachal Pradesh Indigenous Youth Organisation (APIYO), personally confronted Kashmiri vendors and unlawfully assumed administrative authority by accusing them of operating illegally.

Liyak propagated xenophobic conspiracies, alleging the vendors were illegally settling family members to demographically capture the region.

The vendors maintained they had complied with legal procedures and applied for licenses, which were administratively delayed due to local elections, yet they still faced extra-legal vigilantism overriding municipal law enforcement.

• Subversion of Constitutional Guarantees: the annihilation of fundamental rights

The targeted marginalisation and physical coercion of these migrant traders strike directly at the core of the Fundamental Rights guaranteed under Part III of the Constitution of India. This phenomenon goes far beyond isolated criminality, mutating into a systemic subversion of secular constitutionalism where the State’s monopoly on law and order is unlawfully usurped by majoritarian mobs.

Article 14 (Right to Equality and Equal Protection)

Article 14 establishes a dual mandate that the State shall not deny “equality before the law” nor the “equal protection of the laws.” The systematic failure of the state machinery to impartially protect Kashmiri vendors constitutes a severe breach of this foundational guarantee. When law enforcement categorises targeted, identity-based hate crimes as mere “petty theft” (as seen in Kapurthala), or advises victims to flee rather than arresting their attackers (as in Mussoorie), it demonstrates arbitrary state inaction.

The Constitution demands a positive obligation from the State to protect its vulnerable minorities. By allowing vigilantes to operate with relative impunity based solely on the victims’ regional and religious identity, the state apparatus implicitly endorses an unconstitutional, arbitrary classification, effectively creating a sub-class of citizens denied the equal protection of the criminal justice system.

Article 15(2)(b) (Horizontal Prohibition of Discrimination)

While many fundamental rights are enforceable only against the State, Article 15(2)(b) has a horizontal application—it explicitly bars citizens from subjecting other citizens to any disability, liability, or restriction concerning the use of roads and places of public resort on grounds only of religion, race, caste, or place of birth. The systematic interception of vendors on public highways in Punjab, the forced denial of commercial access to bustling public spaces like Mussoorie’s Mall Road, and the blatant, identity-driven housing discrimination faced in Kanpur are textbook violations.

The Constitution envisions public spaces as egalitarian zones; when vigilante mobs construct invisible, exclusionary borders within these spaces, and the State fails to dismantle them, the absolute protection against identity-based public exclusion is shattered.

Article 19 (1) (d) & 19 (1) (g) (Freedom of Movement and Profession)

The “bedrock of India’s economic integration” is cemented by the twin pillars of movement and livelihood. Under Article 19(1)(d), which mandates that all citizens shall have the right “to move freely throughout the territory of India,” the Constitution envisions a borderless nation where geography does not limit a citizen’s presence.

Complementing this is Article 19(1)(g), which grants the right “to practise any profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade or business.” Together, these rights ensure that an Indian citizen’s identity is not tied to their state of origin, but to their contribution to the national economy.

However, this integration is increasingly under siege. While Article 19(6) clarifies that “nothing in sub-clause (g)… shall affect the operation of any existing law… insofar as such law imposes… reasonable restrictions in the interests of the general public,” it is crucial to note that this power is reserved exclusively for the State.

When vigilante groups in Lucknow and Arunachal Pradesh issue “extra-legal territorial ultimatums,” they are not acting under the colour of law; they are engaging in a hostile takeover of state authority. The forced mass exodus of traders from Uttarakhand and the targeted destruction of commercial inventory in Himachal Pradesh are not “reasonable restrictions”—they are violent disruptions of the social contract. These actions bypass the judicial scrutiny required by Article 19(6), replacing the Rule of Law with the Rule of the Mob, and effectively dismantling the economic unity the Constitution seeks to preserve.

Article 21 (Protection of Life and Personal Liberty)

The paramount right of Article 21 ensures that no person shall be deprived of their life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law. The Supreme Court has repeatedly expanded this to include the right to live with human dignity and the right to livelihood. The brutal physical assaults, the near-fatal iron rod attack on a minor in Dehradun, and the ensuing, pervasive climate of terror entirely strip these individuals of their physical security.

Forcing a citizen to choose between their economic survival and their bodily integrity is the ultimate deprivation of personal liberty, executed entirely outside any lawful procedure.

Penal culpability: application of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS)

The actions of the vigilante perpetrators are not spontaneous skirmishes; they map directly onto stringent penal offenses under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. These acts demand rigorous, uncompromising prosecution beyond the mere issuance of written warnings or preventive detention.

Offences of physical violence and restraint

The highway interceptions and physical beatings invoke Section 126(1) (Wrongful restraint). Vigilantes exhibit clear mens rea (criminal intent) by voluntarily obstructing vendors from proceeding in geographic directions they have a lawful, constitutional right to access. Furthermore, the grievous physical injuries inflicted—including shattered bone fractures in Himachal Pradesh and severe head trauma sustained by the 17-year-old in Vikasnagar—strictly attract Section 117(2) (Voluntarily causing grievous hurt). This section mandates severe punitive measures for endangering life and cannot be legally diluted into minor assault charges by investigating officers.

Offences of hate speech, enmity, and religious outrage

The forced majoritarian sloganeering, coercively extracted under the imminent threat of violence, coupled with xenophobic slurs referencing terrorism, transcend mere heckling. These calculated acts attracts Section 302 (Uttering words with deliberate intent to wound religious feelings).

Most critically, the organised assemblies in Shimla calling for widespread economic boycotts, paired with the propagation of fabricated conspiracy theories about Kashmiri vendors, directly violate Section 196 (Promoting enmity between different groups on ground of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony). This section explicitly criminalises the promotion of enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, or place of birth, and penalises any acts prejudicial to the maintenance of communal harmony.

Offences of intimidation and public humiliation

The public parading, violent grabbing of collars, and explicit threats of being burned alive recorded in Haryana represent acute violations of Section 351 (Criminal intimidation) and Section 352 (Intentional insult with intent to provoke a breach of peace). Extorting verbal compliance through mob terror is an assault on personal autonomy. Additionally, the widespread, defamatory conspiracies spread by local leaders regarding the vendors’ motives (e.g., alleging they are demographic invaders or spies) attract immediate liabilities under Section 356(3) and (4) (Defamation).

Institutional apathy: dereliction of statutory Police duties

The most critical and concerning legal failure underpinning this crisis is the institutional apathy and outright abdication of statutory mandates by state police forces. Law enforcement agencies are not merely reactive bodies; they are legally bound by their respective state acts to prevent such vigilantism proactively.

The Uttarakhand Police Act, 2007

Under Section 39 (1), the mandate of the police is unambiguous. They are legally bound to “uphold and enforce the law impartially, and to protect life, liberty, property, human rights, and dignity” (clause a), and must proactively “prevent and control… breaches of communal harmony” (clause c). When Mussoorie police reportedly instructed victimised vendors to vacate the jurisdiction rather than providing a protective state shield against Bajrang Dal mobs, they committed a gross dereliction of their duty to “create and maintain a feeling of security in the community and… prevent conflicts and promote amity” (clause h).

Furthermore, identifying perpetrators of cognizable hate crimes only to release them with mere written apologies fundamentally violates the mandate to accurately register complaints, conduct lawful investigations, and apprehend offenders (clause g). This approach effectively decriminalises mob violence.

The Punjab Police Act, 2007

Similarly, Section 40 of the Punjab Police Act, 2007 strictly mandates the police to uphold human rights impartially, maintain internal security, and proactively collect intelligence regarding threats to social harmony (clause i). By dismissing the repeated Kapurthala hate crimes against a specific demographic as the isolated, uncoordinated acts of “petty criminals” or drug addicts, the police entirely failed their investigative and intelligence-gathering duties, ignoring a glaring pattern of regional profiling.

Moreover, Section 41 legally enforces the “Social responsibilities of the police,” demanding that officers “guide and assist people especially those, needing help and protection” (clause b) and “be impartial and respectful for human rights, with special attention to weaker sections” (clause d). Advising vulnerable, targeted migrant vendors that they must “travel in groups” to avoid being attacked is a profound abdication of sovereign responsibility. It shifts the statutory burden of public safety entirely from the State onto the marginalised victims themselves, constituting a severe and actionable dereliction of statutory duty.

Why judicial intervention and law enforcement is imperative?

The crisis confronting Kashmiri seasonal vendors is a stark indicator of a broader institutional malaise that threatens the foundational integrity of the Indian Republic. The documented incidents reveal that the issue is no longer confined to isolated episodes of mob violence; rather, it has mutated into the dangerous privatisation of law enforcement. When local vigilantes are permitted to unilaterally dictate the terms of commerce, residency, and physical safety—while the state apparatus either acquiesces, re-categorises hate crimes as petty offenses, or advises victims to flee their lawful jurisdictions—the rule of law is effectively outsourced to majoritarian mobs.

Restoring constitutional order requires moving beyond reactive condemnations. It necessitates immediate, suo motu intervention by constitutional courts (Supreme Court and High Courts) to address the glaring gaps in police accountability. To halt the normalisation of identity-based economic displacement, law enforcement officers must face strict departmental and legal consequences for the dereliction of their statutory duties.

Concurrently, the applicable provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita must be unequivocally enforced against perpetrators, entirely stripping away the impunity currently afforded to vigilante networks. Only through uncompromising institutional accountability can the promise of secular constitutionalism and equal protection be salvaged.

While FIRs have been lodged in many of these communally charged assaults the real measure of the deterrence enforced by this act will be visible only if the respective state police are pro-active and visible about the follow-up and prosecutions of these criminal complaints. Typically, while the FIR is the first response after the social media outrage, police rarely follow up with robust prosecutions.

Related:

Right to Food: How the ban on sale of non-veg food is an issue where imposed majoritarian faith clashes with the Indian Constitution

Himachal Haryana, racial harassment and attacks on Kashmiri shawl sellers rage on

Mob lynching: Three separate incidents surface, even minors and partially disabled Muslims not safe

The post The Erosion of Equal Protection: Constitutional attrition and State apathy in targeted attacks on Kashmiri vendors across the states appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Draft Electoral Roll, released on December 16, 2025, revealed the scale of the disruption as over 58.2 lakh names were deleted and more than 1 crore voters flagged for verification, including more than 31 lakh “unmapped” entries that do not link to the 2002 baseline. Citizens have been asked to justify age gaps, parental details, and other historical data, effectively shifting the burden of proof onto individuals and forcing them to produce decade-old documentation.

Challenged in the Supreme Court under Mostari Banu vs Election Commission of India [W.P.(C) No. 1089/2025], the process has been criticised as arbitrary, opaque, and burdensome. On January 19, 2026, the Court has already intervened, directing the ECI to ensure transparency: publish lists of excluded categories at local offices, allow authorised agents to submit documents on behalf of voters, and minimise travel and inconvenience.

Professor Amartya Sen: a noble laureate received SIR notice

One of the most discussed cases was the notice issued to the noble laureate Professor Amartya Sen at his Santiniketan residence in Bolpur. The official notice, written in Bengali, stated that “the age difference between you and your parents is less than 15 years, which is not generally expected and this needs to be clarified,” and directed him to appear for a hearing on January 16 at 12 PM at his Bolpur residence with the “original documents prescribed by the Election Commission of India.”

SIR Notice issued to Prof. Amartya Sen

For Sen, who is in his 90’s and globally recognised for his academic work, the matter drew immediate public attention. All India Trinamool Congress (AITMC) questioned the logic behind the notice to Amartya Sen.

On January 7, the party posted on X that “A Nobel laureate should be above any suspicion, right? But what if he’s a Bengali? Then he’ll be slapped with hearing notices as if he were some common criminal. Amartya Sen, whose ground-breaking works form the bedrock of modern economics, who has brought unparalleled glory to Bengal and the entire nation, and whose ideas are studied in universities across the world, has been issued a SIR hearing notice.”

TMC further added that “This is the cynical, shameful farce of @BJP4India and  @ECISVEEP‘s SIR process. They will drag our icons through the mud, tarnish our pride, and stoop to any low if it serves their Bangla-Birodhi agenda of division and degradation.”

Sen would not need to appear for the hearing: ECI

However, days later, the Election Commission clarified that the case involved minor spelling errors and that Sen would not need to appear for the hearing. Officials added that such discrepancies could be corrected locally by Booth Level Officers without summoning the voter and that the issue had “no bearing on eligibility”, as The Hindu reported.

Unjust to voters and unfair to Indian democracy: Amartya Sen

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has expressed concern over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, saying the exercise is “being done in a hurry” and risks becoming “unjust to voters” ahead of the state assembly elections. According to the Times of India, Sen said that while revising rolls can strengthen democracy, “a thorough review done carefully with adequate time can be a good democratic procedure, but this is not what is happening in West Bengal at this time.”

He added that the SIR gives “inadequate time” for citizens to submit documents and that this is “both unfair to the electorate and unfair to Indian democracy.” Recalling his own case, Sen noted he was questioned about his right to vote from Santiniketan and highlighted documentation challenges, saying, “Like many Indian citizens born in rural India, I do not have a birth certificate.” He warned the poor and underprivileged are most at risk of exclusion.

“Unjust to voters and unfair to Indian democracy.”

After the Hon’ble Supreme Court, Nobel Laureate and eminent public intellectual Amartya Sen has now condemned the SIR process, flagging the UNDUE HASTE with which it is being bulldozed, denying rightful voters the time and… pic.twitter.com/QfG2tMlkaZ

— All India Trinamool Congress (@AITCofficial) January 25, 2026

Admiral Arun Prakash: when the ECI summons a war hero

Former Navy Chief Admiral Arun Prakash, a 1971 war veteran and Vir Chakra recipient, received an SIR notice in Goa. His enumeration form did not include EPIC numbers, roll details, or constituency information, leaving him classified as “unmapped.”

The Election Commission said notices were system-generated and that the process applied uniformly to all citizens. Prakash’s case highlighted that even individuals with notable public service records are included in automated verification if documentation is incomplete.

The #ElectionCommissionofIndia has issued a notice to former chief of #navalstaff Admiral Arun Prakash, asking him to attend a meeting to establish his identity as part of the ongoing #SpecialIntensiveRevision (SIR) of #electoralrolls.
https://t.co/pywWO07xyc

— Deccan Herald (@DeccanHerald) January 12, 2026

SIR notice to Indian cricketer Mohammed Shami

Indian cricketer Mohammed Shami was also summoned for an SIR hearing in Kolkata’s Rashbehari constituency after officials flagged discrepancies in his voter enumeration form. At the time, Shami was in Rajkot representing Bengal in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, prompting him to seek a fresh date on account of his sporting commitments. The Election Commission of India rescheduled the hearing between January 9 and 11, with officials terming the process a “routine verification” necessitated because the form had been “incorrectly filled out.”

However, after appearing for the hearing, the India fast bowler said that, “I am a proud Indian and Bengal citizen. If called 10 times, I will come and prove my citizenship on every single occasion.”

#CricketWIthTOI | “I am a proud Indian and #Bengal citizen. If called 10 times, I will come and prove my citizenship on every single occasion,” said Indian fast bowler #MdShami, who has 462 wickets across formats, after appearing for an SIR hearing on Tuesday to protect his vote.… pic.twitter.com/94YsaMy4OR

— The Times Of India (@timesofindia) January 21, 2026

ECI targeting citizens of West Bengal through SIR: TMC

Moreover, on January 6, TMC general secretary Abhishek Banerjee accused the BJP-led Centre and the Election Commission of jointly “insulting the people of Bengal” and targeting the state ahead of the assembly elections.

Addressing a rally in Rampurhat, Banerjee claimed that Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen had been served an SIR hearing notice and urged party workers to “un-map the BJP from Bengal,” setting a target of winning 250 of the state’s 294 seats. “Many eminent people like actor Dev and cricketer Md Shami were also served notices,” he said, arguing that the exercise reflected a “Bangla-Birodhi” mindset.

Deepak Adhikari aka Dev

Actor and TMC Member of Parliament Deepak Adhikari, also known as Dev, received SIR notices for himself and his family members. TMC councillor Moushumi Das described the notices as unnecessary, noting that a three-term MP was being treated like any other citizen for verification purposes. TMC spokespersons also criticised the process as burdensome rather than corrective.

However, Dev did not make any public statement regarding the notice, as the Indian Express reported.

SIR Notice to Joy Goswami, a Sahitya Akademi Award recipient

Poet Joy Goswami, a Sahitya Akademi Award recipient, was unable to attend his SIR hearing on January 2 due to recent surgeries. His daughter, Devarti Goswami, confirmed that both she and her father had submitted their voter enumeration forms on time. Despite this, both were flagged as “unmapped” because their names did not appear in the 2002 voter rolls, as reported by the Times of India.

The Election Commission later contacted the Goswami family, stating that their case could be resolved without requiring the poet to appear in person. Reports from other districts noted that some elderly voters had experienced health problems while attending hearings.

Education minister Bratya Basu has strongly condemned the action and said that “This only goes on to expose BJP’s views of Bengal and its culture. Joy-da was recently hospitalised and I paid a visit to him there. If Joy Goswami can be called for a hearing, I fear Tagore too would have got call for a hearing had he been alive now. This call is an expression of the respect BJP has for Bengal and Bengalis. Joy-da is an Indian. He is a poet. He has migrated from Ranaghat to Kolkata some 40 years ago and has been a legitimate voter. I am not even talking about literary prowess. If BJP and EC can do this to Joy-da, any person can be called and told ‘ghus petiya’.”

West Bengal State Minister Shashi Panja receives SIR notice

West Bengal state minister Shashi Panja received an SIR notice despite her name appearing in the 2002 voter list. Panja said she had submitted all required documents but was still marked as “unmapped,” and described the process as “conducted in haste and without adequate preparation.”

According to the Telegraph India, Panja stated that she would attend the hearing like any other voter and did not request any special privileges as a minister. The Election Commission included her as part of the general process, which applied to all citizens flagged for verification.

Actor Anirban Bhattacharya

Actor Anirban Bhattacharya received a notice after his voter registration could not be linked to the 2002 rolls. Born in 1986, Bhattacharya currently lives in Kolkata but remains registered in Midnapore. His parents and grandparents were also absent from the 2002 voter list, complicating verification. His father passed away in mid-2025, adding to the challenge of retrospective documentation.

Under the pretext of SIR hearings, ECI is harassing ordinary people, and even eminent personalities of Bengal: Mamata Banerjee

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee criticised the SIR process, stating that Under the pretext of SIR hearings, the Commission is harassing ordinary people, and even eminent personalities of Bengal such as Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, poet Joy Goswami, and actor Dev are facing the same ordeal.

In most cases, it is women whose names are being removed in greater numbers. Notices are being issued in the name of “logistical discrepancy” without providing complete information, TMC alleged.

Under the pretext of SIR hearings, the Commission is harassing ordinary people, and even eminent personalities of Bengal such as Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, poet Joy Goswami, and actor Dev are facing the same ordeal.

In most cases, it is women whose names are being removed in… pic.twitter.com/NucTMvWICR

— All India Trinamool Congress (@AITCofficial) January 8, 2026

Related:

SIR 2025 in Bengal: 5 Key Takeaways That Strike at BJP’s ‘Infiltration’ Bogey

West Bengal Draft Electoral List: Over 58 lakh names deleted under SIR exercise, urban seats & Hindi speakers see higher voter deletions

ECI’s announced nationwide SIR, will cover 12 States and UTs with a reduced documentary burden

The post SIR Notices in Spotlight: from Amartya Sen, war vetereran Arun Prakash to Mohammed Shami summoned for SIR hearing appeared first on SabrangIndia.

This release expanded the number of states and Union Territories with published draft rolls to 12, and taken together, the SIR has already resulted in the provisional deletion of more than 3.5 crore names from voter lists nationwide.

The scale and pace of these deletions have to be read alongside a significant policy recalibration by the Election Commission of India. Following controversies that first surfaced during the Bihar revision, the Commission issued a nationwide instruction on October 27, 2025, retaining the administrative framework of the SIR but relaxing provisions that had triggered legal and political backlash, particularly those relating to document collection and automatic deletions. Acknowledging that the “qualifying date of last intensive revision” varies widely across states—dating back to 2002 in Gujarat and Kerala and to 2003 in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh—the ECI conceded that a uniform, document-heavy verification model was untenable.

This unfolding process continues even as Uttar Pradesh—the most populous state in the country and home to its largest electorate—prepares to publish its draft rolls on December 31, 2025. Far from being viewed as a routine administrative exercise, the SIR has raised profound questions around transparency, procedural fairness, shifting burdens of proof, and the heightened risk of mass disenfranchisement, concerns that have been repeatedly documented and critically examined by Sabrang India through sustained, state-wise reporting on the ground realities of the revision process.

What distinguishes the 2025 SIR from previous revisions is not merely the scale of deletions but the manner in which verification has been conducted. The process has relied heavily on door-to-door enumeration, retrospective linkage to older electoral rolls, and documentary proof requirements that many voters—particularly migrants, informal workers, women, the elderly, and marginalised communities—struggle to fulfil.

While deletions have been officially categorised as relating to deaths, migration, duplication, or non-traceability, civil society groups and independent observers have warned that these categories often mask deeper procedural failures, including non-visits by Booth Level Officers (BLOs), incorrect tagging, and the presumption of ineligibility in the absence of documentation. Against this backdrop, the cumulative picture emerging from state-wise draft rolls is deeply unsettling.

Bihar: Early completion, large-scale deletions

Bihar was among the first states where the SIR process was completed and final rolls published, making it a crucial reference point for understanding the scale and implications of the exercise.

According to figures reported by Sabrang India, nearly 47 lakh names were deleted from Bihar’s electoral rolls, bringing down the total electorate from approximately 7.89 crore to about 7.42 crore. The deletions were attributed to voters recorded as deceased, permanently migrated, untraceable, or duplicated across constituencies.

However, reports and petitioners before the Supreme Court pointed to widespread complaints that enumeration forms were either not delivered or collected, and that entire households of migrant workers were marked absent without follow-up verification.

Uttar Pradesh: The largest test yet, draft rolls on December 31

Uttar Pradesh represents the single largest and most politically significant phase of the SIR. With an electorate running into several crores, the state accounts for a substantial share of India’s voters, making any large-scale deletion potentially transformative. Enumeration in UP was extended on December 11, and the draft electoral roll is now scheduled for publication on December 31, 2025. While deletion figures are not yet officially available, reports suggest that UP may account for a significant portion of the remaining corrections once its draft roll is released.

Rajasthan: Over 41 lakh names provisionally removed in draft rolls

In Rajasthan, the SIR resulted in the provisional deletion of approximately 41.85 lakh names from the draft electoral rolls out of 5, 48, 84, 479 total electorate of the state. The state completed enumeration in early December, with the draft roll published in mid-month i.e., December 16. Official explanations cite deaths, permanent migration, and duplicate entries as the primary reasons for deletion.

मतदाता सूची विशेष गहन पुनरीक्षण–2026
राज्य में प्रारूप मतदाता सूचियों का आज 16 दिसम्बर 2025 को हुआ प्रकाशन – @CeoRajasthan
पढ़ें गणना चरण के प्रमुख निष्कर्ष #शुद्धमतदातासूचीमजबूतलोकतंत्र @ECISVEEP@spokespersonECI @PIB_INDIA @DIPRRajasthan@DDNational@airnews_jaipur… pic.twitter.com/wMbyvF3ypT

— CEO RAJASTHAN (@CeoRajasthan) December 16, 2025

Madhya Pradesh: Detailed categories, massive numbers with 42, 74, 160 deletions

Madhya Pradesh offers one of the most detailed official breakdowns of provisional deletions, with 42, 74, 160 names flagged for removal from the draft rolls on December 23. According to official data reported, these deletions include approximately 8.46 lakh deceased voters, over 31.5 lakh voters recorded as having shifted permanently, around 2.77 lakh duplicate entries, and a substantial number categorised as “unmapped” or unverified.

The enumeration period in MP was extended, and the draft roll was published on December 23, 2025 following a revised schedule. Despite the availability of granular data, activists have questioned whether the categorisation process itself relied too heavily on assumptions rather than verifiable evidence, especially in rural and forested areas.

27 अक्टूबर 2025 की स्थिति में प्रदेश में 5,74,06,143 मतदाता थे। वर्तमान में 5,31,31,983 मतदाता हैं। विशेष गहन पुनरीक्षण (SIR) के दौरान 42,74,160 मतदाताओं की कमी हुई हैं. श्री राम प्रताप सिंह जादौन, संयुक्त मुख्य निर्वाचन पदाधिकारी, मप्र @ECISVEEP @SpokespersonECI pic.twitter.com/dffrxvgNnE

— Chief Electoral Officer, Madhya Pradesh (@CEOMPElections) December 23, 2025

Tamil Nadu: Nearly 97 lakh deletions

Tamil Nadu witnessed one of the highest absolute numbers of deletions, with close to 97 lakh names provisionally removed from the draft electoral rolls out of 6, 41, 14 ,587 of the total electorate of the state. The impact was particularly pronounced in urban centres such as Chennai, where frequent relocation, rental housing, and informal settlements complicate voter registration.

Press release. pic.twitter.com/h02SIQkX4P

— TN Elections CEO (@TNelectionsCEO) December 19, 2025

Enumeration deadlines in the state were extended, and draft rolls were published in the third week of December i.e., December 19, 2025.

The Hindu, on December 22, carried analysis, on the unusual patterns (anomalies) behind the deletions in the state with detailed findings on eight different categories of anomalies: dead voters, voters who were under the shifted/moved categories etc.

This analysis, among other things, reveals that 14 stations show unusually high proportions of young deaths; 35 stations show high gender bias in deletions; 8,613 stations have abnormally high deletion rates; 727 stations report excessive deaths; 3,904 polling stations show high death proportions; 495 polling stations show 100% death-based deletions; 6,139 parts have high numbers of “absent” voters; and 172 parts show suspicious patterns of “permanently shifted” women. The entire analysis may be read here.

West Bengal: Around 58 lakh names flagged for removal

In West Bengal, the SIR process has assumed an acute social and political dimension, with close to 58 lakh names either deleted or provisionally flagged for deletion in the draft electoral rolls published on December 16. Of these, around 50 lakh names were identified during digitised enumeration as potentially removable, a figure that rose sharply within days as categorisation progressed. With a certified electorate of over 7.66 crore, this provisional flagging represented a significant share of voters and triggered widespread anxiety.

Press Note – West Bengal SIR: Publication of Draft Electoral Roll – Key Findings of Enumeration Phase.#SIR #PressNote@ECISVEEP @SpokespersonECI @PIBKolkata @AIRKolkata @DDBanglaNews pic.twitter.com/G6Ix4wyPIz

— CEO West Bengal (@CEOWestBengal) December 16, 2025

Official breakdowns indicated that the majority of cases were marked under standard administrative categories—deceased voters, those recorded as having shifted, untraceable names and duplicates—but the speed and scale of the exercise, rather than the categories themselves, became the source of public distress.

The situation escalated after the state government linked at least 39 deaths to what it described as “SIR-induced panic,” prompting Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to announce Rs. 2 lakh ex gratia compensation for bereaved families and to launch block-level “May I Help You” camps from December 12 to assist affected voters with claims, objections and documentation.

While the Election Commission has maintained that the figures are provisional and subject to hearings and due process, reports from across districts documented confusion among long-registered voters whose names were flagged or missing, reinforcing concerns raised by opposition parties that verification and outreach were uneven in a state marked by high migration, dense urban settlements and socio-economic vulnerability.

Puducherry: Small electorate, significant impact

Though Puducherry’s electorate is relatively small, the deletion of around 1 lakh names constitutes a substantial share of the Union Territory’s total electorate of 10,21,578 as on October 27, 2025.

Press Note 16.12.2025 – Publication of Draft Electoral Roll@ECISVEEP #ECI #SIR #ceolakshadweep pic.twitter.com/s2UPtgrTFF

— CEO LAKSHADWEEP (@LakshadweepCeo) December 16, 2025

Enumeration and draft publication followed the national SIR schedule, but local reports highlighted that many of those flagged or deleted were migrant workers and residents of industrial and peri-urban zones who were unavailable during verification visits, raising concerns about how absence was interpreted during the revision process.

Pess Note-Lakshadweep Special Intensive Revision – Key Findings Of Enumeration Phase@ECISVEEP #ECI #SIR pic.twitter.com/hpsyiETXzA

— CEO LAKSHADWEEP (@LakshadweepCeo) December 16, 2025

Chhattisgarh: Over 27 lakhs provisionally deleted amid security and migration challenges

Chhattisgarh saw the provisional deletion of approximately 27.34 lakh names from its draft rolls. The state’s unique challenges—ranging from internal displacement due to conflict to seasonal labour migration—complicated the enumeration process. Official data categorised deletions into deceased voters, permanently shifted individuals, and duplicate registrations.

23 दिसंबर 2025 को ड्राफ्ट रोल प्रकाशित हो गया है। जिसे आप https://t.co/D5DfuRyplH अथवा https://t.co/S06LG1wQuS पर लॉगिन करके अपना नाम ढूंढ सकते हैं। pic.twitter.com/nAiB3zrY38

— Chief Electoral Officer, Chhattisgarh (@CEOChhattisgarh) December 23, 2025

The enumeration deadline was extended, and draft rolls were published on December 23 following the revised ECI schedule.

SIR 2026 की ड्राफ्ट मतदाता सूची का प्रकाशन 23/12/25 को हो गया है।

ड्राफ्ट मतदाता सूची https://t.co/o4izjd1j8X aur https://t.co/MO0ZmklYlF पर उपलब्ध है।

मुख्य निर्वाचन पदाधिकारी श्री यशवंत कुमार द्वारा अपील की गई कि सभी मतदाता ड्राफ्ट मतदाता सूची में अपना नाम जांच ले, (1/2) pic.twitter.com/FNrvLBlJT9

— Chief Electoral Officer, Chhattisgarh (@CEOChhattisgarh) December 23, 2025

Andaman and Nicobar Islands: High proportionate deletions

In the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, around 64,000 names were provisionally deleted from the draft rolls out of 3,10,404 total electors of the UTs. Given the small population base, this represented a substantial proportion of registered voters. Migration to the mainland and employment-related movement were cited as primary reasons, though verification in remote islands posed logistical challenges.

The Draft Electoral Roll has been formally handed over to representatives of recognized Political Parties.
The successful completion of Enumeration Phase reflects strong public participation and coordinated efforts by election officials and stakeholders, strengthening democracy. pic.twitter.com/Yd1D1frub3

— Chief Electoral Officer, Andaman & Nicobar Islands (@AndamanCEO) December 24, 2025

Kerala: Over 24.08 lakh names removed

Kerala recorded provisional deletions of approximately 24.08 lakh voters, with official breakdowns including deceased individuals, voters permanently shifted out of the state, untraceable persons, and duplicate registrations. Overseas migration played a significant role, with many voters absent during enumeration. The state’s enumeration period was extended, and draft rolls were published on December 23, 2025.

The SIR draft electoral roll has now been published. Voters can file claims and objections from 23 December 2025 to 22 January 2026.#ceokerala #ecisveep #eci #ChiefElectoralOfficer #SIRKerala pic.twitter.com/RghZWqvc5s

— Chief Electoral Officer Kerala (@Ceokerala) December 23, 2025

Gujarat: 73.7 lakh deletions

Gujarat’s draft rolls reflected the deletion of about 73.7 lakh names, largely concentrated in urban and industrial areas. Rapid urbanisation, labour migration, and multiple registrations were cited as key factors. Enumeration deadlines were extended, and draft rolls were released on December 19.

Goa: Over one lakh names flagged for deletion

In Goa, 1,00,042 names were deleted from the draft electoral rolls. Migration, ageing population profiles, and duplication were cited as reasons. The deletions, while smaller in absolute terms, raised concerns in a state with a relatively compact electorate.

The DEO North Goa Ankit Yadav,IAS handing over the the copy the Draft Electoral Roll of SIR 2026 to the representatives of political parties #goa #india #SIR #ECI @ECISVEEP pic.twitter.com/UgAE7fOYqV

— Chief Electoral Office, Goa (@CEO_Goa) December 16, 2025

Lakshadweep: Provisional deletion of 1,429 electors out of 57,813 total electors

Lakshadweep saw the provisional deletion of 1,429 electors out of 57,813 total electors of the UT.

Press Note 16.12.2025 – Publication of Draft Electoral Roll@ECISVEEP #ECI #SIR #ceolakshadweep pic.twitter.com/s2UPtgrTFF

— CEO LAKSHADWEEP (@LakshadweepCeo) December 16, 2025

Revised SIR timelines and the Uttar Pradesh factor

On December 11, the Election Commission revised enumeration and draft publication timelines across 6 states. In Tamil Nadu and Gujarat, enumeration was extended up to December 14, 2025, with draft electoral rolls subsequently published on December 19. Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and the Andaman & Nicobar Islands were granted a longer window, allowing enumeration to continue until December 18, followed by the release of draft rolls on December 23, 2025. Kerala’s revision followed the same trajectory, culminating in draft roll publication on December 23 after extended field verification.

This synchronised release on December 23 marked a critical juncture in the SIR, with draft electoral rolls simultaneously entering the public domain in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Kerala and the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, expanding the total to 12 states and Union Territories where draft rolls have now been published.

Across these jurisdictions, cumulative proposed deletions have already crossed the 3.5 crore mark, showing the unprecedented scale of the exercise. Uttar Pradesh, however, occupies a distinct and consequential position within this revised timeline. As India’s most populous state, it received the most substantial extension, with enumeration permitted until December 26, 2025 and the draft electoral roll scheduled for publication on December 31, 2025.

A process under challenge

Across states, Sabrang India has documented how the SIR, while presented as a technical correction, has unfolded as a high-stakes exercise with far-reaching consequences. With more than 3.5 names already facing deletion across 12 States/UTs and Uttar Pradesh yet to publish its draft roll, the cumulative impact of the revision is unprecedented. The challenge ahead lies not only in correcting errors through claims and objections but in addressing deeper questions about burden of proof, administrative accountability, and the right to vote in a context of widespread mobility and precarity.

Related:

Nearly 50 lakh names flagged for deletion in West Bengal, state government announces Rs. 2 Lakh relief for SIR-linked deaths, CM Mamta Banerjee launches ‘May I Help You’ block camps

ECI’s announced nationwide SIR, will cover 12 States and UTs with a reduced documentary burden

SIR exercise leaves trail of suicide across states as BLOs buckle under pressure and citizens panic over citizenship

The post SIR: Over 3.5 Crore electors flagged for removal across 12 states in SIR, Uttar Pradesh will publish its draft rolls on December 31 appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The scattered incidents observed around Dussehra are not, as they might first appear, spontaneous expressions of religious fervour. They are the visible markers of a deeply entrenched, highly coordinated “hate agenda.” This agenda involves a network of right-wing organisations, explicit political patronage, and the strategic co-option of state and secular institutions.

This investigation, based on an analysis of dozens of events across India in 2025, will argue that the modern Shastra Poojan campaign is a multi-pronged political project. It is designed to (1) subvert secular public spaces, including universities and police stations, (2) normalise the public display of weapons as a symbol of religious-political power, (3) provide a sanctioned platform for anti-Muslim hate speech and communal incitement, and (4) indoctrinate a new generation—targeting young girls and children—by framing violence and weapon-bearing as a religious and civic duty. This is not about faith; it is about fomenting fear, asserting dominance, and preparing the ground for future conflict.

The breach of the secular citadel: co-opting universities and state machinery

The most concerning aspect of this pattern is its audacious encroachment into spaces that are, by design, secular and non-partisan: government institutions and universities. This tactic serves a dual purpose as it legitimises the weapon-centric ritual by stamping it with the state’s seal of approval, and it simultaneously attacks the very foundations of secularism in public life.

The Rajasthan University RSS event: a microcosm of conflict

The incident at Rajasthan University (RU) on September 30, 2025, stands as a revealing example of how the ritual is being politically instrumentalised. The university administration, with the Vice-Chancellor’s approval, granted permission to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) to hold a Shastra Poojan ceremony within the campus premises—effectively allowing a partisan socio-political organisation to occupy an academic space. This decision marked a serious institutional lapse, blurring the line between education and ideology. Reported Times of India.

The sequence that followed was both avoidable and foreseeable. Student leaders from the NSUI staged a protest against what they viewed as the communalisation of their university. The situation spiralled when a section of NSUI members reportedly vandalised the event stage set up by the RSS, triggering clashes between the two groups. 

राजस्थान यूनिवर्सिटी में RSS के कार्यक्रम के शुरू होने से पहले NSUI कार्यकर्ताओं ने मंच पर चढ़कर पोस्टर फाड़े और पोडियम गिराया

यह ताकत है कांग्रेस की संघियों देख लिया

pic.twitter.com/u4xLPyA4Xw

— Sandeep Singh (@ActivistSandeep) September 30, 2025

The police, instead of intervening impartially, allegedly stood by during the confrontation and later detained several NSUI members, including State President Vinod Jakhar. They were held for nearly 48 hours and booked under serious, unrelated charges.

Former Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot later remarked that “no action” was taken against RSS members accused of initiating the violence. 

राजस्थान विश्वविद्यालय में RSS द्वारा शस्त्र पूजा का कार्यक्रम रखना ही आपत्तिजनक है। शिक्षा के स्थान को इस तरह की राजनीतिक गतिविधियों के लिए इस्तेमाल करना कैसे उचित माना जा सकता है? जब NSUI के कार्यकताओं ने इसका विरोध किया तो पुलिस ने बल प्रयोग किया। इसके साथ ही, RSS के… pic.twitter.com/Ew6d2doKen

— Ashok Gehlot (@ashokgehlot51) September 30, 2025

The episode, in essence, reflects a chain of administrative misjudgements—had permission for such an event not been granted in the first place, the confrontation and its aftermath might never have escalated into a larger controversy. The Rajasthan University incident thus encapsulates a troubling pattern that secular institutions are being repurposed as ideological venues, dissent is criminalised, and impunity becomes institutionalised.

State sanction from law enforcement: the Gwalior police incident

If the RU incident demonstrates the subversion of education, the events in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, demonstrate the co-option of law enforcement itself. On October 2, 2025, At the DRP line, a Shastra Poojan event was not just permitted; it was actively participated in by the highest-ranking police officials. The Inspector General (IG), Deputy Inspector General (DIG), and Superintendent of Police (SP) were all present, firing celebratory shots from service weapons. The event was further legitimised by the presence of top political figures, including Assembly Speaker Narendra Singh Tomar, as Dainik Bhaskar reported.

This event shatters the illusion of a neutral police force. When the state’s guardians of law—those entrusted with a monopoly on legitimate violence—publicly and ritualistically worship weapons alongside partisan politicians, the line between law enforcement and ideological militia evaporates. It sends an unambiguous message to the public and to the officers themselves: the state’s power and the party’s ideology are one and the same. On many occasions, police permissions are granted because, in many cases, the police themselves are participants.

The organisational machinery:  coordinated national campaign

The incidents might appear as “scattered incidents” actually belies the reality of a highly coordinated, nationwide campaign. The list of events from September and October 2025 reveals a clear organisational footprint, dominated by a familiar network of Hindutva groups. This is not a grassroots phenomenon but a top-down strategy.

The key players: VHP, Bajrang Dal, AHP, and Durga Vahini

The key organising force behind this nationwide campaign appears to be the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) and its youth wing, the Bajrang Dal. Their operational footprint is vast, creating a dense cluster of events across Madhya Pradesh. 

On October 2, in Indore, they conducted a Shastra Pujan displaying and worshipping swords and guns. 

This was mirrored in multiple Bhopal events on October 2, including one on Vijay Dashami where dozens of guns and swords were displayed and a speaker called weapons “essential for the protection of dharma” while peddling “love jihad” conspiracies.

On October 2, at another Bhopal event participants brandished guns and swords, chanting, “Who will protect the country, women, and cows? We will.” 

The pattern continued in Sihora, Jabalpur on October 2, where members brandished guns and swords while speakers justified keeping weapons for self-defense.

On September 29, a similar event unfolded in Bina Etawa, which also featured members brandishing guns and swords as speakers justified weapon possession for self-defense.

This template was replicated across the country. On October 2, in Agra, Uttar Pradesh guns and swords were worshipped and religious slogans were raised. 

Likewise in Jammu participants worshipped guns and swords and raised religious slogans on October 2, 2025

In Odisha, VHP-Bajrang Dal events followed the same script. The event in Godabhaga, involved brandishing and worshipping weapons. 

On October 2, the ceremony in Gudbhela also involved displaying and worshipping weapons.

On October 2, in Dhanakauda, a rally was held after the puja where participants brandished their weapons.

Operating in parallel, on October 2, the Antarrashtriya Hindu Parishad (AHP) and its arm, the Rashtriya Bajrang Dal, led by Pravin Togadia, organised their own series of weapon worship events. Togadia glorified the Babri Masjid demolition, calling it “an act of bravery,” and declared, “Until we started the Ram Mandir movement, only temples were demolished and mosques built over them. This was the first time we demolished that Babri structure and made a temple.” He warned, “To the dreamers of Ghazwa-e-Hind, remember — it is on your chest we built the Ram Mandir. That is just the start; Kashi and Mathura are waiting to be constructed on your chests.”

On September 28, in Mandla, Madhya Pradesh, their ceremony involved public processions and martial demonstrations with weapons. 

On September 28, in nearby Seoni, MP, their event also included a procession with members brandishing swords, while a speaker justified violence in the name of religion by citing religious texts. 

On September 30, in Simbhaoli Hapur, Uttar Pradesh, AHP leader Gaurav Raghav explicitly linked the ritual to protecting “dharma, daughters and sisters, and cows,” peddled the “Love Jihad” conspiracy, and urged followers to arm themselves against “Jihadis.”

Targeting women and children: the role of Durga Vahini

Crucially, the concern about “young girl students being manipulated” is substantiated by the central role of the VHP’s women’s wing, Durga Vahini, and its partner group, Matru Shakti. Their involvement is a deliberate strategy to frame weaponisation as “empowerment” and “self-protection.”

• On September 28, in Rampura, Neemuch (MP), Durga Vahini and Matru Shakti members organised Shastra Puja at multiple Garba pandals, brandishing weapons.

• On September 26, in Hatta, Damoh (MP), a VHP-Bajrang Dal event explicitly “involved children in exhibiting weapons,” with Durga Vahini members in attendance

• On October 2, in Adegaon, Seoni (MP), VHP, Bajrang Dal, Matrushakti, and Durga Vahini organised a program where “young children and girls” worshipped swords.

• On September 30, in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, a VHP-Durga Vahini event on Durga Ashtami, attended by “large numbers of women and children,” featured speakers who peddled the “love jihad” conspiracy, explicitly linking the need for such “awareness” to the Vahini’s founding.

This organisational synergy, replicated from state to state, proves that these are not isolated events. They are the planned execution of a national agenda, sharing a common script, common targets, and a common goal.

From ritual to rhetoric: the weaponisation of hate speech

This leads to the crux of the matter: these events “evolve into platforms for hate speech and inflammatory remarks.” The Shastra Poojan is merely the stage; the main performance is the propagation of communal hatred and open calls for violence. The weapons are not just symbolic props; they are a backdrop that physically underscores the violent rhetoric being delivered.

A platform for vile, anti-Muslim incitement

The speeches delivered at these events are not subtle. They are direct, eliminationist, and consistently target the Muslim community.

• Bhopal, MP (Sadhvi Pragya): On September 28, at a VHP-Durga Vahini event, former BJP MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur delivered a virulently anti-Muslim speech. She urged Hindus to “assault non-Hindu sellers” near temples, referred to all Muslims as “jihadis,” and claimed they “could never consider Hindu women as sisters”

This speech was given in front of an arsenal of displayed guns, swords, and other weapons.

• Indore, MP (Tannu Sharma): On October 1, VHP-Bajrang Dal leader Tannu Sharma used his Shastra Pujan speech to promote the “love jihad” conspiracy in its most graphic form, claiming Muslim men are “trained in mosques to target Hindu girls” for trafficking and to be used as “baby-making instruments.” He then issued a direct call for beheading: “He urged Hindu women to follow Kalka Mata and ‘behead’ anyone who dares to target them”

• Kanpur, UP (Madhuram Sharan Shiva): October 3, at a Ramlila forum, the leader of the “armed-monks group” Shiva Shakti Akhada, Madhuram Sharan Shiva, declared, “To destroy sin, the sinner must be destroyed.” He explicitly called on youth to “fight and eliminate ‘jihadis,’ likening them to demons (rakshas).”

Mainstreaming conspiracy and glorifying violence

The hate speech is built upon a foundation of well-worn conspiracy theories and the glorification of past violence.

• “Love Jihad” and “Land Jihad”: This theme is ubiquitous. On September 30, in Hapur, UP, AHP leader Gaurav Raghav linked the ritual to protecting “dharma, daughters and sisters” and peddled the “Love Jihad” theory to justify arming against “Jihadis”

October 2, in Nagod, Satna (MP), a VHP-Bajrang Dal speaker, with guns displayed on stage, targeted Muslims by invoking both “love jihad” and “land jihad” conspiracies.

• Glorifying Babri Demolition: October 2, in Surat, Gujarat, AHP President Pravin Togadia used a “Trishul Deeksha” event to glorify the Babri Masjid demolition as an “act of bravery.” He then issued a direct threat for future action: “That is just the start; Kashi and Mathura are waiting to be constructed on your chests.”

• Worshipping Godse: The glorification extends even to the assassin of Mahatma Gandhi. October 2, in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, the Hindu Sena held a Shastra Pujan “chanting slogans in praise of Nathuram Godse.” 

This was repeated in Ujjain, MP on October 2, where Hindu nationalists “worshipped weapons and a portrait of Nathuram Godse.”

This evidence confirms the analysis completely. The Shastra Poojan is the legitimising framework for events whose primary purpose is to spread hate, dehumanise Muslims, and openly call for their elimination, all while normalising violence as a sacred duty. This directly leads to events like the Cuttack clashes and other riots, as the weapons and the incitement from these events spill over into the streets.

A pedagogy of violence: indoctrinating the next generation

Perhaps the most insidious component of this agenda is the focus on “young girl students” and children. This is not about self-protection; it is a systematic “pedagogy of violence.” It seeks to indoctrinate children at their most impressionable age, severing their connection to a secular society and re-forging their identity around the twin poles of weaponry and communal hatred.

The evidence for this is widespread and deeply disturbing.

• Giving weapons to children: On October 2, in Ujjain, MP, the indoctrination was explicit: “swords were given to young girls.” 

On September 26, in Hatta, Damoh (MP), “Children were involved in exhibiting weapons” at a VHP-Bajrang Dal-Durga Vahini event.

• Martial demonstrations: On September 29, in Udaipura, Raisen (MP), a VHP-Matrushakti event featured “many children performing martial demonstrations using” weapons.

This was also seen in Mandla, MP on September 28, at an AHP-Rashtriya Bajrang Dal event. This normalises the weapon as an extension of the child’s body.

• Chants of hatred: The indoctrination is both physical and verbal. On October 2, in Maharashtra, far-right influencer Sangram Bapu Bhandare, at a Shiv Pratisthan Hindusthan Shastra Pooja, “led armed children in chanting, ‘Tu Durga ban, tu Kali ban, kabhi na burke wali ban’ (You become Durga, you become Kali, never become one in a burqa. This is a direct, hateful chant that pits one religious identity against another, taught to armed children.

• Posing with weapons: On October 1, in another event in Maharashtra, “Children, including young girls, posed with trishuls” under the guidance of an AHP leader. 

On October 2, in Adegaon, Seoni (MP), “young children and girls” were documented worshipping swords.

This strategy aims to create a future generation for whom public weapon-bearing is normal, communal hatred is righteous, and violence is a celebrated tool for religious assertion. It is a long-term project to ensure the pipeline of cadres for this extremist agenda never runs dry.

The architecture of impunity: egal legality and political patronage

The legal basis for stopping these events is clear, rooted in existing statutes that are routinely ignored. The core of the issue lies in The Arms Act, 1959, which is not just about firearms.

• Section 2(1)(c) defines “arms” to include “sharp-edged and other deadly weapons… as the Central Government may… specify.”
• Section 4 strictly prohibits the acquisition or possession of any firearm without a license.
• Section 5 controls the manufacture, sale, and transfer of arms.

The argument that trishuls are merely “religious symbols” is a deliberate smokescreen, one that has been legally challenged and documented for decades. Reports from as far back as 2003 noted that items distributed at Trishul Deeksha events were often “cleverly disguised Rampuri knives, six–eight inches long and sharp enough to kill.” This led the Rajasthan state government itself, in April 2003, to issue a notification “prohibiting people from distributing, acquiring, possessing or carrying double or multi-bladed sharp pointed weapons” as per a report in The Times of India.

This ban was openly defied by organisations like the VHP, setting a long-standing precedent of conflict between these events and state law. The illegality extends far beyond just possession. The Arms Act provides clear authority for law enforcement to act:

• Section 20 allows police to arrest anyone “carrying or conveying any arms under suspicious circumstance” without a warrant.
• Section 22 empowers the District Magistrate to order a search and seizure of any arms believed to be for an “unlawful purpose.”
• Section 25 outlines punishment for the unlicensed sale or transfer of arms.

The claim that these processions are protected as an “essential religious practice” under Articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution has also been tested and refuted by the Supreme Court. In the landmark 1983 case Acharya Jagdishwaranand Avadhuta v. Commissioner of Police, Calcutta (1983) 4 SCC 522, the Court ruled that the Ananda Marga’s Tandava dance with items including a trishul and a knife was not an essential religious rite that could be performed in a public procession. 

The Court affirmed that such public displays are subject to regulation by the state for “public order,” a precedent that directly applies to today’s armed processions.

The copy of judgement Acharya Jagdishwaranand Avadhuta v. Commissioner of Police, Calcutta (1983) can be found here

Despite this clear legal framework, attempts to enforce it on a macro level have been thwarted, contributing to the architecture of impunity. 

Following widespread communal violence during Ram Navami processions in 2022, a PIL was filed in the Supreme Court by Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) in May 2022. This petition sought the creation of national guidelines to regulate these armed religious processions.

The plea was dismissed by the Supreme Court on December 9, 2022. The bench, led by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, declared that law and order is a “state subject” and that the court could not be “dragged into every area.” The court also remarked that one should not “portray that all religious festivals are the time for riots.” 

This dismissal effectively denied a national-level regulatory framework, placing the onus back on the same state and district-level authorities—the DMs and police—who, as seen in Gwalior and Rajasthan University, are often participants or enablers. This judicial deference, while procedurally sound, in practice grants a free pass, ensuring that the law remains on the books but is rarely, if ever, enforced on the streets.

The argument that these are merely “religious symbols” like trishuls is a deliberate smokescreen. The evidence from 2025 shows this is patently false. These events openly and proudly feature modern firearms, transforming the ritual into a menacing display of force.

• Guns and Rifles as centrepieces: The public display of firearms is a consistent theme. 

On October 2, in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, a VHP-Bajrang Dal event on Vijay Dashami saw participants displaying “dozens of guns, swords, and other weapons.” 

On September 28, at another Bhopal event featuring ex-MP Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, the proceedings “also featured guns, swords, and other weapons” as a backdrop to her inflammatory speech.

On October 2, in Indore, Madhya Pradesh, a VHP-Bajrang Dal Shastra Pujan involved the worship and display of “swords, guns and other weapons.”

This was mirrored in Jammu, where on October 2, VHP and Bajrang Dal members organised a Shastra Pujan “worshipping swords, guns, and other weapons” 

On October 2, in Agra, Uttar Pradesh, a VHP-Bajrang Dal event was characterised by the “displaying [of] guns, swords and other weapons.”

On October 2, in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, an AHP and Rashtriya Bajrang Dal procession “worshipped and displayed guns, swords and other weapons.” 

On September 29, in Bina Etawa, Madhya Pradesh, VHP-Bajrang Dal members “brandished guns and swords.”

On October 2, in Nagod, Satna (MP), a VHP-Bajrang Dal event featured “several guns on stage” while speakers targeted Muslims.

• Political displays of massive firepower: This display of weaponry is not limited to militant organisations; it is also a tool for political strong-arming. On October 2, in Kunda, Uttar Pradesh, the event was a staggering show of force at the residence of a sitting politician. MLA Raghuraj Pratap Singh, popularly known as Raja Bhaiya, “held a Shastra Pujan displaying hundreds of guns and rifles at his residence.”

This act, involving an arsenal far beyond any symbolic need, demonstrates a fusion of political power and a capacity for violence, sending an unambiguous message of dominance.

The mass distribution of trishuls, particularly in states like Rajasthan, also contravenes the law, as these are often sharpened and designed as weapons. But the open display of hundreds of unlicensed (or even licensed) firearms in a public, politically charged gathering is a blatant violation of The Arms Act and provisions of the CrPC related to unlawful assembly.

The enablers: political patronage and state impunity

This illegality thrives because it is protected from above. The involvement of “influential figures—MPs, MLAs, and politicians” is not a suspicion; it is a documented fact.

• Elected officials: MLA Raja Bhaiya (Kunda, UP), Assembly Speaker Narendra Singh Tomar (Gwalior, MP), and ex-MP Sadhvi Pragya Thakur (Bhopal, MP) all actively participated in and legitimised these events.
• Government Llegitimisation: A key part of this legitimisation is the government’s formal decision to lift long-standing bans on employees participating in such events, removing any professional consequence for state actors who align with this agenda. This process reversed decades of policy. The initial ban, which barred central government employees from participating in the activities of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), was first imposed on November 30, 1966, and pointedly reiterated on October 28, 1980, to ensure a secular outlook in the bureaucracy. 

This 58-year-old prohibition was officially lifted by the central government via an office memorandum from the Department of Personnel and Training on July 9, 2024. This move paved the way for state governments, such as the BJP-led government in Rajasthan, which, around August 24, 2024, issued its own circular lifting a similar 52-year-old ban, thereby granting explicit permission for state employees to participate in RSS activities. As per reports in the The Hindu.

• Systemic impunity: The “no legal action” outcome is the rule, not the exception. The Rajasthan University incident is the most damning proof that the victims are jailed, and the attackers walk free. In Cuttack, as has been noted, rioters with weapons faced no consequences. This is a deliberate tactic, one that draws parallels to the Gujarat Riots: the state machinery steps back (or actively assists) to allow “religious celebrations” to morph into organised violence, knowing that the legal system will be deployed to protect the perpetrators and punish any resistance.

This is how permissions are granted. This is how the law is ignored. The agenda is state-sanctioned, protected by powerful politicians, and enforced by a compromised or complicit law enforcement and legal system.

A year of weaponised faith: the continuum from Ram Navami to Ganpati

While the Shastra Poojan events of Dussehra 2025 present the most recent manifestation of this trend, they are merely the crescendo of a year-long symphony of hate. To view them in isolation is to miss the systemic nature of the rot. An analysis of events stretching back through 2025—encompassing Ram Navami, Ganpati Visarjan, and Durga Puja—reveals that the weaponisation of religious festivals is no longer an anomaly, it has become the standard operating procedure of the right-wing outfits. 

This sustained aggression is not accidental. It is the inevitable yield of over a decade of the current regime’s governance, a period characterised by the systematic dismantling of constitutional values and the emboldening of majoritarian forces. The frequency and ferocity of these displays are direct metrics of how deeply the “Hindu Rashtra” project has penetrated the social fabric, sanctified by political patronage and shielded by a compromised state machinery.

The Ganpati festival: from devotion to macabre propaganda

The Ganpati festival in September 2025 witnessed a disturbing shift where the celebration of the deity was side-lined for the promotion of gruesome political propaganda. 

In Madhya Pradesh, a state that has become a laboratory for right-rings’ experimentation, religious tableaux (jhankis) were utilised to broadcast graphic Islamophobic imagery. In Mahidpur, Ujjain, on September 5, a tableau explicitly promoted the “Love Jihad” conspiracy theory, depicting Muslim men slaughtering women. This was not a subtle dog whistle but a visual scream designed to provoke, leading inevitably to communal tension and stone-pelting. 

In Mahadevgarh, Khandwa, on September 5, another tableau featured a refrigerator with mutilated dolls—a crude exploitation of a high-profile murder case—to suggest that Muslim men are inherent butchers of women. 

In Kasravad, Khargone, on September 7, similar gory visuals were paraded through the streets. These were not religious processions; they were mobile hate-speech units, designed to instil fear in minorities and radicalise the majority, turning a festival of joy into a procession of trauma. 

The “Decade Plus” of impunity: the state as an extension of the mob 

This was explicitly articulated in Karnataka during the Ganpati Visarjan. In Raichur, on September 16, VHP-Bajrang Dal State Convenor Shivananda Sattigeri delivered a speech that stripped away any remaining veneer of the rule of law. He did not just threaten violence; he claimed ownership of the state apparatus, asserting that “the police and army are all Hindus” and that the Prime Minister is aligned with the RSS. He threatened to “chop off the hands” of dissenters and warned that legal challengers would be “beaten and sent to Pakistan.” 

The rhetoric is echoed by elected representatives, further blurring the lines. On September 10, in Maddur, Mandya, BJP MLC C.T. Ravi publicly threatened Muslims with “beheading” and “cutting,” reminding them of the consequences of “showing strength.” When lawmakers speak the language of lynch mobs, the weaponisation of festivals ceases to be a law-and-order issue and becomes a state-sponsored project of intimidation. 

Durga Puja: the gendered radicalisation 

The narrative of 2025 also highlights how this weaponisation is deeply gendered, using the imagery of the Goddess to militarise women and children against a fabricated “other.” During the Durga Puja festivities, the VHP and its wings, Durga Vahini and Matru Shakti, intensified their campaign to frame Muslim men as existential threats. 

In Gaya, Bihar, on September 30, women were made to brandish weapons, while in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, on the same day, speakers used the platform of Durga Ashtami to peddle “Love Jihad” conspiracies to a captive audience of women and children. The message was clear: your faith requires you to be armed. 

This indoctrination has reached the level of hate-filled conditioning for children. 

In Maharashtra, on October 2, far-right influencer Sangram Bapu Bhandare led armed children in a chant that pitted the identity of the Goddess against the identity of the Muslim woman: “Tu Durga ban, tu Kali ban, kabhi na burke wali ban” (Become Durga, become Kali, never become the one in the burqa). By weaving hate into the rhymes and rituals of children, the regime’s ideological affiliates are ensuring that the cycle of violence continues well beyond the current political tenure. 

The calendar of hate: how a decade of impunity weaponised 2025

The festivals of 2025 have ceased to be mere celebrations of faith but they have morphed into a synchronised calendar of intimidation. This year’s timeline—stretching from the aggressive posturing of Ram Navami, through the macabre tableaux of Ganpati Visarjan, to the open weaponisation of Durga Puja—reveals a terrifying new normal. 

In Madhya Pradesh, the sanctity of Ganesh Chaturthi was desecrated by floats depicting gruesomely mutilated women, designed solely to incite anti-Muslim hysteria under the guise of “Love Jihad.” In Karnataka, the mask of democracy slipped entirely when BJP leaders publicly threatened beheadings, and VHP convenors declared the police and army to be extensions of the RSS.

This unchecked aggression is not spontaneous but it is the toxic harvest of a “Decade Plus” of the current regime. Ten years of majoritarian party rule have systematically dismantled the firewall between the state and the street. 

The normalisation of a violent public square

The 2025 Shastra Poojan campaign, as documented here, is not an expression of Hindu faith. It is the tactical expression of a political agenda that views violence, intimidation, and communal hatred as legitimate tools. It is the “weapon agenda” in its most tactical form.

The evidence is overwhelming. We are witnessing a systematic effort to subvert India’s secular institutions, transforming universities into ideological battlegrounds (Rajasthan University) and police forces into partisan participants (Gwalior). We are seeing a coordinated, nationwide campaign by the VHP, Bajrang Dal, and AHP to use these events as platforms for the vilest, eliminationist hate speech, explicitly calling for the assault (“assault non-Hindu sellers”) and murder (“behead,” “eliminate jihadis”) of Muslims.

Most chillingly, we are watching the deliberate indoctrination of children. By placing swords in the hands of young girls (Ujjain), making children chant anti-Muslim slogans (Maharashtra), and having them perform martial demonstrations (Udaipura), this agenda is attempting to create a new generation for whom violence is not just normal but sacred.

This entire enterprise is shielded by a formidable architecture of political impunity, where MLAs (Raja Bhaiya), MPs (Sadhvi Pragya), and Assembly Speakers (Narendra Singh Tomar) provide cover. The law is rendered meaningless, as police either participate in the rituals or, as seen in Rajasthan, arrest the very students protesting the illegality.

This is the terrain. The ritual of Shastra Poojan has become the chosen vehicle for normalising violence, mainstreaming hate, and asserting a militant religious supremacy over the public sphere. The parallel to pre-riot tactics in places like Gujarat is not just an academic reflection, it is a clear and present warning.

When a mob leader can openly claim the state apparatus as “theirs” without fear of arrest, it proves that impunity has been institutionalised. The most chilling aspect of this year’s agenda was the targeted radicalisation of families, women brandishing swords and children chanting hate before they can fully understand faith. 

We are witnessing the solidification of a “militant piety,” where the sword replaces the prayer, and the Constitution is quietly suspended in favour of the rule of the mob. These incidents stand as a warning that the secular citadel is not just being breached, it is being dismantled, festival by festival, under the protective gaze of the state.

Related:

Speaker at VHP weapon worship event openly targets the religious minorities of India, calls them top enemies

Arm yourself with knowledge, not tridents, swords or knives

FIR over hate speech and brandishing of swords at Udupi Durga Daud event

The post The ‘Shastra Poojan’ Project: How the ritual of weapon worship is being recast as a tool of power and hate propaganda appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The bulk of entries flagged so far fall into the categories that commonly prompt removal of deceased voters, those who have shifted addresses, untraceable names and duplicates.

The state’s electoral roll, as last certified on October 27, 2025, lists 7,66,37,529 registered voters. In proportion, the provisional 50-lakh figure represents a significant chunk of the electorate. Election officials and the Chief Electoral Officer’s office have stressed repeatedly that this is a provisional outcome of the digitisation exercise and must be understood in the administrative sequence that follows publication of the draft list, notices, hearings and disposal of claims and objections, and finally the ECI’s checks and permission for the final roll.

The draft list was scheduled for publication on December 16, 2025, with hearings and verification to follow before any name is finally deleted.

According to The News Minute, the officials working at the CEO’s office provided a breakdown of the roughly 50-lakh provisional cases: more than 23 lakh were classified as “deceased,” over 18 lakh as “shifted,” and more than 7 lakh as “untraceable,” with the remaining entries attributed to duplicates or other removal reasons. These categories mirror the normal administrative reasons that electoral rolls are pruned; however, the speed and scale of the flags — not just the categories themselves — have alarmed voters, civil society groups and political parties alike.

The final numbers will depend on hearings and verifications scheduled between mid-December and early February 2026.

How SIR became a public crisis

Petitioners challenging the SIR in the Supreme Court have argued on December 2 that the Special Intensive Revision is illegal and unconstitutional, claiming that the scale, timing and manner of its implementation violate established electoral norms. Despite the pendency of these challenges, voter-list revision remains, on its face, a routine democratic duty that both the State and the Election Commission of India are obligated to maintain accurate rolls so that eligible voters are neither omitted nor counted more than once.

Even so, aspects of the present exercise — its pace, concentrated timelines, the extensive door-to-door verifications carried out by Booth Level Officers (BLOs), and the near-real-time visibility of digitisation flags — unfolded in an environment of heightened public attention, leading to widespread anxiety among sections of the population. Social media circulation, intense political scrutiny and fragmented information channels further contributed to confusion about what provisional flags meant, particularly among vulnerable citizens.

In several districts, police and administrative logs recorded citizens who said they feared losing their names or being confronted with legal consequences because of missing paperwork. Interviews collected by reporters from families of victims described panic, confusion and, in some cases, pre-existing vulnerability — old age, lack of regular identity documents, migratory labour status or poor literacy — as the factors that turned an administrative notice into a cause of intense personal distress. The pattern of panic is not unique to this revision: previous national episodes where large administrative drives intersected with inadequate public outreach have produced similar outcomes. What made the present wave distinct was the speed with which thousands of provisional deletions became visible and the proliferation of alarming claims — anecdotal and political — across platforms, The News Minute reported

Field staff reported pressure, and the death of a few BLOs earlier in the exercise crystallised wider concerns. Employee associations, local administrators and civil society groups told reporters that the compressed timeframes required an exceptional workload from BLOs, who must complete verifications under deadlines, often with server or app issues, poor transport or unclear instructions. The tragic deaths reported during this period sparked urgent questions about whether adequate staffing, mental-health support and realistic timeframes accompanied a process of such scale.

#WATCH | Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala | BLOs across the state boycotted work in protest over the suicide of a BLO in Kannur. They marched to the office of the Chief Electoral Officer
In other districts, protests were held at the District Collectorates. The protest was jointly… pic.twitter.com/i7vhS7VEsc

— ANI (@ANI) November 17, 2025

The tally of deaths and the state’s response

In the last weeks of the SIR exercise, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) compiled and presented lists of deaths they allege were linked to SIR-induced panic. The TMC delegation took such lists to the Election Commission and made repeated public claims that dozens of people, including BLOs and ordinary citizens, had died as a direct or indirect result of the SIR exercise. The party’s public figures described the deaths as a humanitarian crisis and a political failure of the SIR implementation. The TMC tabled “40” or “39” as the number of deaths in various submissions and press interactions, as the Times of India reported

On December 2, 2025, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced a Rs. 2 lakh ex gratia payment for the families of 39 people she said had died due to “SIR-panic,” and Rs. 1 lakh for persons whose condition worsened during the verification exercise but who survived. The announcement was presented by the state as a humanitarian step to assuage grief and to remind citizens that the SIR process is not punitive in itself. The CM and state officials insisted the measure was necessary given the scale of distress and to underline the government’s role in supporting affected families.

For years, Delhi’s Bangla-Birodhi cabal has sat like vultures on Bengal’s rightful dues worth ₹2 lakh crore. And today, the same BJP that weaponised the Election Commission to ram SIR down Bengal’s throat is suddenly pretending to care about BLOs’ honorarium.

If the Centre had… pic.twitter.com/JaAJvMGKq0

— All India Trinamool Congress (@AITCofficial) December 1, 2025

The TMC also submitted lists to the Election Commission during a delegation meeting in New Delhi where party leaders voiced sharp criticism of the ECI and its conduct of SIR in West Bengal. The party accused the ECI of being insensitive to the emotional and social consequences of the drive, citing the deaths and hospitalisations reported from various districts. The TMC’s demonstrations and delegations intensified public and media focus on the human consequences of the revision exercise.

Sharing herewith my today’s letter to the Chief Election Commissioner, articulating my serious concerns in respect of two latest and disturbing developments. pic.twitter.com/JhkFkF6RWs

— Mamata Banerjee (@MamataOfficial) November 24, 2025

The ECI, meanwhile, has responded to the allegations in court and in public statements. According to The Hindu, in affidavits and hearings before the Supreme Court, the Commission described claims of mass disenfranchisement as “highly exaggerated” and maintained that the SIR is a constitutionally mandated and transparent administrative exercise intended to maintain accurate electoral rolls. The ECI also warned political parties against intimidating BLOs and stressed that any names flagged during digitisation will get due process in the notice, hearing and objection windows before final deletion.

These institutional exchanges — TMC’s claims and ECI’s rebuttals — unfolded in parallel to the state government’s relief announcements.

What the ECI says and what courts are hearing

The ECI’s defence of SIR in the Supreme Court highlighted that digitisation trends alone do not determine final deletions and that the statutory safeguards of notice, hearing and disposal of objections must play out. In written affidavits, the Commission argued that allegations of systematic disenfranchisement were factually unfounded and politically motivated, pointing to the processual safeguards embedded in electoral law. The Commission’s public posture included cautionary notices to political actors to avoid intimidation of field officers and to allow BLOs to complete verifications unhindered.

At the same time, political delegations from West Bengal argued before the ECI and in the media that the pace, the timing and the perceived motives behind SIR risked alienating communities and that the ECI needed to exercise greater sensitivity. These tensions — legal, administrative and political — set the terms for the weeks leading up to and following the publication of the draft roll on December 16, 2025.

Mamata’s public outreach: ‘May I Help You’ camps and rallies

In response to the surge of panic, and framed as a rights-protection measure, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced a large-scale outreach plan. Beginning on December 12, the state government will set up “May I Help You” camps across every block in West Bengal.

The stated objective of these camps is to assist people whose names are flagged in the draft roll, help them assemble or correct documentation, guide them through the claims and objections process, and ensure that no genuine voter is removed simply for lack of paperwork. The camps are also meant to offer a visible and immediate reassurance to citizens that the state will actively support them during hearings and verifications.

Mamata has deployed these announcements in public rallies and district visits where she has framed the SIR process as being politically charged and pushed by the Centre.

‘কোটিবার বাংলা ভাষায় কথা বলব!’ — বিজেপিকে চ্যালেঞ্জ জননেত্রী মমতা বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়ের।#MamataBanerjee pic.twitter.com/xhYemx9K5K

— Banglar Gorbo Mamata (@BanglarGorboMB) December 3, 2025

In rallies, she has warned against “weaponising” the revision and has called on party workers and local officials to assist citizens in the help camps. The CM’s public speeches have combined administrative directives (the establishment and staffing of camps) with political claims about motives and effects, aiming to both reassure vulnerable residents and mobilise political solidarity ahead of the assembly elections scheduled for 2026.

Mamata’s own account on X (formerly Twitter) amplified the compensation announcement and the help-camp plan: her verified handle posted the government’s decisions and appealed for calm, signposting the administrative steps being taken in the coming days. Official state and party handle also circulated schedules for district-level visits, helpline numbers and details of local camp venues as these were finalised.

It is sad and unfortunate that we have lost 29 precious lives due to disruption in health services because of long drawn cease work by junior doctors.

In order to extend a helping hand to the bereaved families, State Government announces a token financial relief of Rs. 2 lakh…

— Mamata Banerjee (@MamataOfficial) September 13, 2024

Helplines, camps and the practicalities of the relief plan

State officials described the “May I Help You” camps as a three-part intervention as immediate assistance to citizens flagged in digitisation (document checks and form help); facilitating representation at ERO hearings by informing registered claimants about hearing dates and rights; and providing limited financial relief where deaths or serious health deterioration could be credibly linked to SIR-induced distress.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has firmly addressed feⱥrs around the ongoing SIR (Special Identification and Registration) exercise, assuring the public that “no one will go to Bangladesh.” She announced “May I Help You” camps beginning December 12 across the state,… pic.twitter.com/LQWhKNBleI

— The Logical Indian (@LogicalIndians) December 4, 2025

The camps are to be staffed by government clerical personnel, local health-and-welfare officers and — in places — TMC volunteers, according to state releases. The efficacy of these camps will depend heavily on local logistics: transport to block headquarters, staffing levels, coordination with electoral officers and clear public communication about timelines and required documents.

The state said the payments for bereaved families — the Rs. 2 lakh ex gratia — would be expedited and administered through district disaster relief desks or equivalent welfare channels. For survivors who suffered severe illness during the SIR period, officials said a Rs.1 lakh assistance would be made available upon verification of medical records and circumstances. The practical implementation — how quickly families will receive money, whether the assistance will be disbursed as one-time grants or routed through existing welfare programmes — will be closely watched by the media and rights groups in the weeks ahead, as the Times of India reported

Moreover, the SIR exercise in West Bengal encapsulates a difficult administrative paradox that electoral rolls must be accurate to preserve democratic fairness, yet the processes that produce that accuracy must be implemented in ways that avoid causing social harm. The provisional flagging of nearly 50 lakh names created a public crisis because the mechanical outcome of digitisation met a social reality where millions of citizens — some undocumented, some mobile, some vulnerable — lacked reassurance about what a provisional flag meant for their legal rights.

The West Bengal government’s compensation for families and the creation of block-level “May I Help You” camps are immediate, targeted responses to the humanitarian fallout; the ECI’s court submissions and processual guarantees are the institutional reassurance that legal safeguards remain in place. Whether these parallel interventions will restore confidence will depend on the quality of on-ground implementation: transparent hearings, accessible help desks, rapid disbursement of relief where appropriate, and a clear, plain-language public information campaign explaining rights and remedies.

Related:

SIR exercise leaves trail of suicide across states as BLOs buckle under pressure and citizens panic over citizenship

Pregnant woman deported despite parents on 2002 SIR rolls, another homemaker commits suicide

Haunted by NRC fears, 57-year-old West Bengal man dies by suicide; Mamata blames BJP for turning democracy into a “theatre of fear”

The post Nearly 50 lakh names flagged for deletion in West Bengal, state government announces Rs. 2 Lakh relief for SIR-linked deaths, CM Mamta Banerjee launches ‘May I Help You’ block camps appeared first on SabrangIndia.