SIR in UP: Urban voters want their names back in village rolls, leave BJP in a fix

The BJP faces an unusual complication as Uttar Pradesh Special Intensive Revision nears completion. (File: PTI)

The Bharatiya Janata Party faces a unique challenge as the first phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls heads for a wrap in Uttar Pradesh. A significant number of urban voters are applying to shift their enrolment to their native villages, a trend that could chip away at the party's strongest electoral base ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections in the state.

Top BJP leaders have been scrambling since reports emerged that submissions of enumeration forms in key urban constituencies were unusually low. A look at the reasons behind it revealed that thousands of city residents with ancestral land in rural UP were opting to shift their voter registration, fearing potential complications in land ownership if they remained enrolled only as urban voters.

People in the city who have properties within 20–200 km are keen on shifting their vote to their village address, a senior BJP leader in Lucknow told The Indian Express, adding that such people are being requested to retain their votes in the city. Still, if they don’t agree, we will ask them to shift only one member of the family to the village address and maintain that of the others in the city, he said.

The BJP's worry stems from the understanding that urban voters typically show low enthusiasm on polling day and are unlikely to travel long distances to cast their vote from their villages, a scenario that could be damaging for the party, as several urban voters are seen as BJP's supporters.

The numbers are worrying for the party. In Lucknow alone, the BJP estimates that 10–12 per cent of the electorate may shift out, translating to over 2.6 lakh voters across the Lok Sabha seats in the district. In Prayagraj, party leaders say nearly 2 lakh voters have already opted to move their registrations back to their villages. In Ayodhya (Faizabad Lok Sabha constituency), the estimate is over 41,000.

The concern is not merely theoretical. In 2024, the Congress won Allahabad by 58,795 votes. Even if a quarter of the two lakh voters shifting out of Prayagraj are BJP loyalists, the party believes the arithmetic could become significantly tougher when UP votes in 2027.

Defence Minister and Lucknow MP Rajnath Singh has spoken to state BJP chief Bhupendra Chaudhary about the issue, while party president JP Nadda has sought regular updates from state leaders. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath moved quickly, directing all MPs and MLAs to prioritise SIR coordination.

Since then, the BJP's entire top brass including Deputy CMs Keshav Prasad Maurya and Brajesh Pathak, state president Bhupendra Chaudhary, and organisation general secretary Dharampal Singh has been holding marathon meetings across Varanasi, Lucknow, Noida, Ayodhya, Prayagraj, Agra and Mathura.

Sources cited by the newspaper said leaders were also asked to skip "all weddings for the next few days" to oversee SIR work. At multiple review meetings, Singh is learnt to have pulled up local leaders for their lack of seriousness. BLAs have been asked to personally contact families considering a shift and reassure them that their rural land ownership will not be affected if they retain their urban voter registration.

The political stakes for the BJP here are unmistakable. Urban UP has remained the BJP's backbone across election cycles. Even in 2024, when the party's Lok Sabha tally plunged from 62 to 33, it still won 12 of the state's 17 urban seats. In the 2022 Assembly election, the BJP swept 65 of 86 urban segments. In the 2023 municipal polls, the party won all 17 mayoral posts and over half of all corporator seats.

A sustained outflow of urban voters to rural constituencies threatens to unsettle this foundation. Unlike cities, rural contests in UP are more caste-fragmented and competitive, and the BJP's dominance there is far from assured.