Cong urges Chief Electoral Officer to conduct SIR in phases in TG

Metro India News | Hyderabad

The ruling Congress in Telangana on Friday urged the chief electoral officer to conduct the SIR process in phases over 1.5 to two years, noting that no major elections are scheduled in the state during the next two to three years.

The Election Commission on May 14 rolled out phase 3 of the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls across 16 states—among them Telangana—and three union territories, covering 36.73 crore voters in a staggered manner beginning May 30. State Congress president B Mahesh Kumar Goud, who met the chief electoral officer here to convey the party’s concerns and suggestions, said that if the SIR exercise were carried out hastily within two to three months, it could lead to “undesirable consequences” and “prove disastrous.”

He alleged that the large-scale deletion of voters during the SIR process altered the electoral outcome in West Bengal. While 90 lakh names were deleted from the electoral rolls in the eastern state, only 30 lakh were added, he claimed.

“What we understand from this is that the votes of secular-minded voters were removed. We submitted a memorandum to the chief electoral officer to prevent such a situation in Telangana,” Goud told reporters.

“As no major elections are scheduled in the next two to three years, the SIR process may suitably be spread over a period of 1.5 to two years. Adequate time would facilitate the resolution of objections, reduce public apprehensions, and lessen administrative pressure,” he said in a memorandum submitted to CEO C Sudharshan Reddy.

Recalling that the previous SIR exercise in Telangana, when it was part of undivided Andhra Pradesh, was conducted in 2002 over a period of nearly three months without haste, Goud said the number of voters in the state has increased substantially since then, along with a corresponding rise in the workload of government officials. Therefore, the present exercise should be planned in a meticulous and phased manner, he said. As the Census process is also underway, both responsibilities should not be assigned to the same personnel, he added.

Representatives of recognised political parties should be provided with the electoral rolls of 2002 and 2025 in both soft and hard copy formats, the state Congress president said. The period currently prescribed for filing objections should be extended to at least two months. Similarly, every citizen should be given a minimum of three months to respond to any notice issued under the SIR process, he said.

Before the name of any voter is deleted, a minimum seven-day written notice must be served. Instances from other states indicate that deletions have been made without proper notice, sometimes on the basis of hearsay or unverified home visits.

In Telangana, notices should be served personally or through a documented process in the presence of witnesses. Further, a minimum response period of one month should be granted before any decision is taken.

“The Supreme Court has clarified that the Election Commission cannot demand proof of citizenship. The SIR process must not, therefore, become directly or indirectly a backdoor National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise, and must remain confined to the lawful process of voter registration,” he said.

Among other suggestions, Goud said verification of voters by Booth Level Officers (BLOs) should be properly documented through prescribed forms or entries in the relevant app. Proof of at least three home visits, supported by geo-tagged photographs, should be made mandatory, he added.