By Dr. Gyan Pathak
The mystery of voter list manipulation in Bihar through SIR of the Electoral roll has further deepened on September 1, 2025, the earlier announced last day of submission of claims for deletion and addition. There are lakhs of addition and deletion requests pending before the Election Commission of India (ECI) as of 10 AM. ECI has said in the Supreme Court of India that claims and objections can be filed with respect to the draft electoral rolls even after September 1 deadline and that all such claims and objections filed before the last date of nominations will be considered. It is worth recalling that Bihar Vidhan Sabha election is due in November 2025, and the date of publication of final electoral roll is September 30. Supreme Court has noted the “trust deficit” between the ECI and the Opposition political parties, while both are making claims and counterclaims, creating greater confusion.
Voter list manipulation is done in two ways – addition of voter and deletion of voters. The Opposition INDIA bloc has been alleging that ECI has conspired with the ruling BJP to allow unfair addition and deletion of voters. ECI on the other hand has been claiming that they are only cleaning the electoral roll, while BJP has been supporting them, while claiming that illegal Muslim Bangladeshi infiltrators had been enrolled in the electoral roll. ECI has also said that they have found many illegal foreign migrants from Nepal, Bangladesh, and Myanmar, in the voter list. ECI had said that in the Draft Electoral Roll published on August 1, about 65 lakh voters were excluded from the voter list.
ECI was not initially ready to publish the name of the voters excluded, but had to publish it after an order of the Supreme Court of India. In between August 1 and September 1, the ECI bulletin mentioned that they have received only 25 claims for inclusion in the voter list while only 119 requests were made for exclusion.
The bulletin has created mystery by mentioning that they BJP has filed 16 objections for exclusion, while mentioning that the other five national political parties – BSP, AAP, CPI(M), INC, and NPP filed zero claims for inclusion and zero objections for exclusion. As for the state political parties ECI said that CPI(ML) filed 15 requisitions for inclusion and 103 for exclusion. It stated that RJD has requested only for 10 inclusion. Altogether, total number of claims filed by political parties were only 25 for inclusion and 119 for exclusion.
ECI bulleting said that they received zero claims by EROs for inclusion of eligible electors and exclusion of ineligible electors. It said that the commission has received 36,475 requests for inclusion and 2,17,049 for exclusions directly from the electors. It said that it had received 16,56,886 requests from BLAs for inclusion of new electors on attaining 18 years of age or above.
One can clearly see something fishy about the ECI’s information since Bihar CEO has confirmed receiving letters from Congress for the deletion of around 89 lakh names from the Bihar draft electoral roll in the past couple of days. Bihar CEO has responded to Congress claim which contradicted by ECI claim that political parties are not coming forward with claim and objections. Congress leader Pawan Khera had said on August 31 that the Election Commission of Bihar had previously refused to accept the filed complaints and is claiming through sources that no political party has filed any objection.
Khera had said, “The election commission, through sources, has planted that no political party is objecting; one must have heard this. We also got to know that we did not do anything. Congress has submitted 89 lakh complaints to the Election Commission. We kept on doing our work silently and smiled at the sources. We then understood why zero complaints.” He said that we got to know that complaints are not taken from our BLAs when they go to submit them, instead they are saying they will take from individuals.
Bihar CEO has said on X that “The Presidents of the District Congress Committees of the Indian National Congress have, in the last 1-2 days, submitted letters to the District Election Officers in Bihar, requesting the deletion of the names of around 89 lakh (8.9 million) people from the electoral rolls.” However, he said that such complaints can only be submitted with a declaration, in prescribed form.
It should be noted that the reporters’ collective has already found in their investigation of thousands of illegal entries of voters from outside the state, near-duplicate voters, dubious voters, and deleted voters. Other sources, including the political parties have also given proof how many live people’s name are deleted by calling marking them dead or permanently shift. Millions of other found their name deleted since they could not submit the document the ECI demanded. Millions have only Aadhaar card, which ECI refused. Now Supreme Court of India has ordered the ECI to accept Aadhaar card.
During the hearing on September 1, Supreme Court bench led by Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi requested the Executive Chairman of the Bihar State Legal Services Authority to issue instructions by Tuesday before noon to all the District Legal Services Authorities to depute/notify para legal volunteers, along with their names and mobile numbers, who will assist the individual voters and political parties for the online submission of claims, objections or correction. Each paralegal volunteer shall thereafter submit a confidential report to the concerned District Judge.
The business of deletion and addition of voter remains a contentious issue, and the claims and counter claims by ECI and political parties and individual electors have eroded the trust of people on the SIR of Bihar Electoral Roll, which needs to be restored immediately. It is well known in India how bureaucratic technicalities are used against the people who run from pillar to post to get their work done, even so simple a work as addition and deletion of names from the voter lists. ECI should take not of all discrepancies in the Draft Electoral Roll irrespective of who pointed them out, and in what format they have informed the ECI. Keeping discrepancies intact on the technical grounds will not be a wise thing, since it would defeat the basic purpose of cleaning the electoral roll. (IPA Service)
