'Will cause large-scale disenfranchisement': INDIA bloc leaders raise concerns with EC, oppose SIR in Bihar

The Congress leader said the delegation believes that 2.5- 3 crore voters may be disenfranchised in this exercise.

Leaders of as many as eleven INDIA bloc parties met the Election Commission (EC) on Wednesday over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter rolls in Bihar and raised their concerns, and alleged that over two crore voters of the state may be disenfranchised by this exercise being done just ahead of assembly elections later this year.

The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of Bihar’s electoral rolls that began on June 28, the first intensive revision since 2003, is scheduled to conclude on September 30 with the publication of the updated voter rolls. The process, however, has got off to a bumpy start courtesy of the immense confusion among voters about the exercise.

Briefing the media after the meeting, Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi said: “A minimum figure of 2 crore persons may be disenfranchised in this exercise as many, especially, the SCs/STs, migratory and impoverished among the nearly 8 crore voters in Bihar, may not be in a position to present their and their parents’ birth certificates to the poll authorities in such a short period of time.”

“We asked the EC that the last revision was in 2003 and for 22 years after 4-5 elections have happened, were all those elections faulty or imperfect or unreliable,” Singhvi said, adding that the SIR was held one year before general elections and 2 years before assembly elections.

The Congress leader said the delegation believes that 2.5- 3 crore voters  may be disenfranchised in this exercise.

Meanwhile, RJD leader Manoj Jha also said that the meeting, during which they questioned if the exercise was about disenfranchising people, was “not cordial”. Jha, who is also a rajya Sabha MP said, “We expressed our concern about the poor, backward classes in Bihar. We saw lack of concern from the Election Commission.”

Additionally, CPI(ML) General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya targeted the Commission and said their doubts and worries about the SIR have increased after the meeting because they did not get any satisfactory reply. “We said the poor will not have these documents. They said those who are in the 2003 voters’ list will be presumed to be citizens of India, the rest will have to prove their citizenship to the EC,” he said.

The Election Commission has issued instructions to carry out a SIR in Bihar to weed out ineligible names and ensure all eligible citizens are included in the electoral roll, allowing them to exercise their franchise in the polls slated later this year. The poll watchdog has said it has taken additional steps in the intensive revision to ensure illegal migrants do not get enrolled in the voters list.