The Election Commission of India’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls has emerged as one of the most consequential administrative exercises in India’s recent electoral history. As per the latest data reported on 9 August 2026, over 1.5 crore names have been deleted so far in the ongoing third phase of SIR, covering 16 States and three Union Territories, with draft rolls published for 12 of them. What makes this exercise particularly significant for Bihar is that the State was the very first to undergo this revision in 2025, making it the template against which every subsequent phase — including the ongoing SIR 3.0 — is being measured and refined.
The SIR exercise is not a routine administrative update; it is a full-scale re-verification of India’s electoral rolls, requiring voters to prove their citizenship and eligibility through a specified list of documents. The Bihar SIR, conducted ahead of the 2025 Bihar Assembly election, triggered intense political controversy, allegations of mass disenfranchisement, and ultimately a constitutional challenge before the Supreme Court. In March 2026, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the constitutional validity of the Election Commission’s power to conduct such a revision, a judgment that now underpins the legal architecture for SIR being replicated nationally.
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For UPSC and SSC aspirants, this topic sits at the intersection of constitutional law, electoral governance, federalism, and social justice — precisely the kind of multi-dimensional issue that Mains examiners favour. It also carries a direct Bihar dimension: the state’s experience of enumeration, deletions, claims and objections has shaped the EC’s operating procedure (SIR framework) being used pan-India today, making Bihar not merely a participant but the originator of this transformative electoral reform.
Background and Context
Five Important Key Points
- The Special Intensive Revision was first conducted in Bihar in 2025 ahead of the Assembly election, later expanding to Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, and now to 16 more States and three Union Territories including Delhi, West Bengal, Odisha, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Uttarakhand.
- In the ongoing third phase, more than 1.5 crore names have been deleted across 12 States where draft rolls have been published, out of a total of 13.77 crore voters, amounting to an 11.51% deletion rate on account of absent, shifted, or dead voters.
- The Supreme Court in March 2026 unanimously upheld the constitutional validity of the Election Commission’s power to conduct SIR, closing one major avenue of legal challenge while leaving room for individual grievance redress through claims and objections.
- Andhra Pradesh recorded the highest absolute deletions at 44.89 lakh names, while Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu recorded the highest proportion of deletions at 29.64%, exposing wide regional variation in enumeration quality and migration patterns.
- In Assam, due to the pre-existing National Register of Citizens (NRC) process, the Election Commission has conducted a “special revision” rather than a full SIR, indicating that the Commission is willing to calibrate its methodology to local legal and administrative contexts.
Bihar as the Template: Genesis of SIR
Bihar’s electoral rolls had not undergone a comprehensive, ground-up revision for decades, and by 2025 concerns about duplicate entries, deceased voters remaining on rolls, and migrant workers being undercounted had reached a political flashpoint. The Election Commission’s decision to launch SIR in Bihar was framed as a means to “purify” the electoral roll before the Assembly election. Booth Level Officers (BLOs) went door-to-door, and voters were required to fill enumeration forms and, in many cases, furnish one of a specified list of citizenship and residency documents. The scale of deletions in Bihar and the manner of enumeration became a national talking point, with opposition parties alleging that genuinely eligible voters — particularly migrant labourers, the poor, and marginalised communities — risked being wrongfully excluded.
Constitutional and Legal Framework
The Election Commission derives its authority for such revisions from Article 324 of the Constitution, which vests in it the “superintendence, direction and control” of elections, read with the Representation of the People Act, 1950, which governs preparation of electoral rolls. The Supreme Court’s March 2026 ruling affirmed that this power extends to a special intensive revision distinct from the annual summary revision, provided due process — including adequate notice, opportunity for claims and objections, and non-arbitrary application of citizenship-linked eligibility criteria — is followed. This judgment is significant because it settles, at least for now, the tension between the EC’s plenary powers under Article 324 and the citizen’s fundamental right to vote, which the Supreme Court has read as a constitutional and statutory right rather than a pure fundamental right under Part III.
Governance Concerns and the G.B. Road Case Study
A poignant illustration of implementation challenges comes from Delhi’s G.B. Road red-light district, where over 2,800 sex workers face potential disenfranchisement because they lack the documents demanded by the EC — birth certificates, school records, or an extract from the previous SIR — since many were trafficked into the profession as minors and have no verifiable place of birth. Of these women, only 650 are currently on the rolls, and a Booth Level Officer reported that 783 out of over 1,300 voters in her booth alone had been marked “shifted,” including 450 sex workers. This case exposes a structural governance gap: SIR’s document-based verification model assumes a settled, document-rich citizenry, which does not account for India’s vast informal, migrant, and marginalised populations — a category into which large sections of Bihar’s own migrant workforce also falls, given that Bihar has one of India’s highest rates of out-migration for work.
Economic and Social Implications
The deletion of over 1.5 crore names carries significant implications for political representation and welfare targeting, since voter ID often serves as a proxy identity document for accessing government schemes. If deletions disproportionately affect the poor, migrants, and undocumented citizens — as feared in Bihar and now flagged in Delhi — it could inadvertently exclude the most vulnerable from both the franchise and welfare architecture, undermining the constitutional promise of universal adult suffrage under Article 326.
Way Forward
The Election Commission should institutionalise a standing grievance redress mechanism with extended timelines for claims and objections, particularly for migrant-heavy states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Jharkhand. A differentiated documentation standard for marginalised groups — including the homeless, sex workers, and undocumented migrants — should be developed in consultation with civil society, drawing on Bihar’s post-SIR grievance data. Greater transparency in publishing booth-level deletion data, combined with independent third-party audits, would enhance public confidence. Finally, given Bihar’s pioneering role, its post-SIR outcomes — including voter turnout patterns and legal challenges — should be systematically studied by the EC before finalising the national SIR framework.
Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations
For UPSC Mains, this topic is central to GS-II (Indian Polity: Election Commission, Article 324, Representation of the People Act, federalism, and rights of citizens) and can also feature in Essay papers on electoral reform or inclusive governance. For SSC examinations, aspirants should note key terms: Special Intensive Revision (SIR), Election Commission of India, Article 324, Representation of the People Act 1950, Booth Level Officer (BLO), National Register of Citizens (NRC), and the Supreme Court’s March 2026 judgment upholding SIR’s constitutional validity.