Congress Alleges EC’s SRI Of Electoral Rolls In Bihar Carries Huge Risk Of Willful Exclusion Of Voters

Even as the Election Commission of India team is in Bihar to carry out the announcement of Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls, the Congress on Thursday said that the proposed revision carries a huge risk of willful exclusion of voters using the power of the state machinery. 

The Congress EAGLE team comprising of Ajay Maken, Praveen Chakrabarty, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Digvijaya Singh, Pawan Khera, Gurdeep Singh Sappal, Nitin Raut and Vanshi Chand Reddy in a statement said that the Election Commission issued a notification on June 24 this year to undertake a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in Bihar ahead of the upcoming state elections in a few months. 

“SIR means that the EC will visit every single household and re-enroll every eligible voter in the state of Bihar after a verification of identity and residential documents. In simple terms, the EC wants to discard the current electoral rolls entirely and create a fresh new electoral roll for the state,” the statement said.

It said that this is a “clear and explicit admission” by the EC that “all is not well” with India’s electoral rolls. 

It said that this is exactly what the Congress and the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi have been repeatedly pointing out with evidence from Maharashtra.

Targeting the EC, the Congress said: “But SIR is a devious and dubious idea in the disguise of a solution. Lakhs of union and state government officials will now control and dictate who has correct documents and who doesn’t, who gets to vote in the upcoming Bihar elections etc. This carries a huge risk of willful exclusion of voters using the power of the state machinery.”

It also alleged that the EC has come up with arduous rules for providing birth certificates of voters and their parents depending on the year of birth. 

“These rules are arbitrary, whimsical and onerous on the estimated 8.1 crore eligible voters in Bihar in 2025 according to the report of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, November 2019.

It also stated that the Commission had mooted a proposal on March 8, 2025 for electoral roll cleaning using Aadhaar, which while not perfect, is a more viable alternative solution than an SIR in Bihar. 

“Why did the EC abandon that to suddenly announce an SIR three months after the Aadhaar proposal?” Congress asked.

Taking a jibe at the poll panel, the Congress said that given the EC’s dogged resistance to it’s long pending demand for Maharashtra electoral rolls and its dubious actions in the past, “there is enough reason to be suspect about EC’s plans for an SIR in Bihar just a few months before an election”.

“The Congress party firmly opposes the SIR proposal of the EC for the Bihar state elections and subsequently in other states,” it added.

Earlier in the day, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), which is one of the main alliance partner of the Congress in Bihar, also slammed the poll panel’s move and threatened to protest across the state. 

Earlier in the day, RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav also slammed the Election Commission and alleged that the panel works as an agent of the BJP. 

He also alleged that there is a conspiracy to remove the names of poor and mwrginalised from the voter list. 

Tejashwi Yadav also announced that RJD will hold protest against the poll panel if names.of poor are removed from electoral rolls. 

The election for the 243 member assembly in Bihar is scheduled to take place later this year. The RJD, Congress and Left Parties Mahagatbandhan is looking to wrest power from the NDA comprising Nitish Kumar led Janata Dal United, the BJP, LJP Ramvilas and the Jitan Ram Manjhi led HAM-S. 

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