Voter list update: TN, Gujarat, MP, Chhattisgarh, UP get more time for SIR; no relief granted to West Bengal

Election Commission revises the Special Intensive Revision calendar after state requests, extending voter enumeration and draft roll publication in Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh and Andaman & Nicobar Islands.

The Election Commission of India (EC) has extended deadlines for voter enumeration and draft electoral roll publication in five states and the Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands under the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

The revised schedule, issued on Thursday, affects Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh and Andaman and Nicobar Islands, following requests from their Chief Electoral Officers, the EC said in a statement, as cited by PTI.

The move will give field teams more time to complete household-level verification and enumerate electors before the draft rolls are released later this month.

Under the new timetable, electors in Tamil Nadu and Gujarat can now submit enumeration forms till Sunday, December 14, according to The Indian Express. The draft rolls for these two states will be published on December 19, instead of December 16.

For Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the deadline for submitting forms has been extended to December 18. Their draft electoral rolls will now be released on December 23.

Uttar Pradesh has been granted the longest extension: voter enumeration there will continue till December 26, with the draft rolls scheduled to be published on December 31, The Indian Express added.

For Goa, Puducherry, Lakshadweep, Rajasthan and West Bengal, the schedule remains unchanged. Enumeration ends on Thursday and the draft rolls will be published on December 16 as originally planned.

Kerala is already on a different track. The state had earlier been granted an extension till December 18 for enumeration, with its draft electoral roll now due on December 23.

With Thursday’s decision, multiple states will now publish their draft rolls on three separate dates, December 19, December 23 and December 31, instead of a single uniform date for all. That creates a more staggered revision calendar, concentrating the latest timelines in the largest electorates, notably Uttar Pradesh.

The EC had announced the SIR for nine states and three Union Territories on October 27. The original schedule set December 4 as the last date for submitting enumeration forms and December 9 for publication of draft rolls.

On November 30, the Commission extended these deadlines by a week to December 11 and December 16, respectively, for all 12 jurisdictions. Thursday’s revision is the second adjustment to the SIR calendar, but this time limited to six states/UTs and driven by state requests, according to the EC.

The final electoral rolls for all 12 states and Union Territories are, for now, still slated to be published on February 7, as per the earlier programme. The EC has not announced any change to that final cut-off.