Phase III of EC’s Voter Roll Revision Drive to Cover 40 Crore Electors Across 22 States, UTs

The Election Commission (EC) is preparing to launch the third phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls across the remaining 22 states and Union Territories in the coming days, officials said on Monday. The exercise is expected to cover nearly 40 crore electors , completing a nationwide clean-up of voter lists.

The rollout had been delayed due to recent Assembly elections in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Assam and Puducherry. With the poll process now over, the EC is expected to resume the revision exercise shortly.

The next phase will cover Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana and Uttarakhand, along with Union Territories including Delhi, Chandigarh, Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir and Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.

So far, SIR has been completed in 10 states and three Union Territories, covering nearly 60 crore voters . According to EC data, the combined electoral rolls in the revised regions have shrunk by 10.2 per cent , from 50.99 crore voters to 45.81 crore after the exercise.

The election authority said it removed 66.88 lakh entries belonging to deceased voters from the electoral rolls, with Uttar Pradesh accounting for 25.47 lakh deletions and West Bengal for 24.16 lakh . Separately, another 63.16 lakh voter records were struck off after objections were examined and verified during the revision process , pushing the overall number of deletions to nearly 1.3 crore names .

The EC had earlier instructed election officials in 22 states and UTs, including Delhi, Maharashtra and Telangana, to complete preparatory work for the nationwide revision.

The exercise, however, has triggered political controversy. Opposition parties, including the Trinamool Congress, accused the EC of targeting voters opposed to the BJP. Mamata Banerjee had also approached the Supreme Court over the revision process in West Bengal.