SIR of Electoral Rolls and the Demand to Remove the CEC: Articles 324 and 326 Under Constitutional Scrutiny

Protests seeking the removal of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar and the suspension of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls entered their third day on Sunday, 4 October 2026. In New Delhi the police stopped a march towards Jantar Mantar on Ashoka Road and detained around 500 people. In Mumbai, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray and MNS chief Raj Thackeray led a march against the exercise. Opposition leaders claim that around 13 crore names have been removed from draft rolls nationwide.

The controversy has deepened on several fronts. Supreme Court judge Justice Ujjal Bhuyan, speaking at NALSAR, Hyderabad, said that any process disenfranchising millions is “intrinsically arbitrary”. Opposition parties are preparing an impeachment motion against the CEC. The Keralam government has ordered a preliminary Vigilance inquiry into a 20-year-old allegation against him. In The Hindu’s editorial pages, former Lok Sabha Secretary General P.D.T. Achary argues that the law makes no mention of a “special intensive revision”.

The issue goes to the core of electoral democracy. Universal adult suffrage, free and fair elections and an independent Election Commission are part of the constitutional foundation. For aspirants, the topic combines Articles 324 to 329, the Representation of the People Acts, Supreme Court precedent and institutional accountability. It is therefore a high-probability theme for GS-II and the Essay paper.

Background and Context

The electoral roll is prepared under Section 21 of the Representation of the People (RP) Act, 1950, and Rule 25 of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960. SIR is an intensive, house-to-house, document-based revision. It was first carried out in Bihar in 2025 and has since been extended in phases to many States and Union Territories.

Five Important Key Points

• Section 21(3) of the RP Act, 1950 allows a “special revision” of the roll for a constituency or part of one, for reasons recorded in writing.
• Article 324 vests the “superintendence, direction and control” of elections in the Election Commission of India (ECI).
• Article 324(5) provides that the CEC can be removed only in the manner and on the grounds applicable to a Supreme Court judge, under Article 124(4).
• Reports say over nine crore notices have been served in the second and third SIR phases, and Delhi alone has issued 33.1 lakh notices.
• Justice Bhuyan said the name of a voter once enlisted cannot be deleted without notice and hearing, except in the case of a dead voter.

Constitutional Framework

Articles 324 to 329 form the constitutional scheme for elections. Article 326 guarantees adult suffrage to every citizen aged 18 or above, subject to disqualification under law. In Mohinder Singh Gill v. Chief Election Commissioner (1978), the Supreme Court held that Article 324 is a reservoir of power, but one that operates within the law and cannot override statutes. In Indira Nehru Gandhi v. Raj Narain (1975), free and fair elections were held to be part of the basic structure. In Anoop Baranwal v. Union of India (2023), a Constitution Bench ruled that ECI appointments must be made by a committee including the Leader of the Opposition and the Chief Justice, pending legislation. Parliament then enacted the CEC and Other ECs (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023, which replaced the Chief Justice with a Union Cabinet Minister.

The Legal Basis Controversy

The core dispute is whether SIR has statutory backing. Achary points out that Section 21(2) provides for intensive or summary revision before elections or when directed by the Commission, and that Section 21(3) provides for special revision. The Constitution Bench-era scheme, he argues, has no category called “special intensive revision”. The ECI’s defence rests on Article 324’s residuary power and on the discretion in Section 21(2)(c) to direct revision “in the prescribed manner”. When challenges to Bihar’s SIR were heard in 2025, the Supreme Court allowed the exercise to continue but directed that Aadhaar be accepted as an additional identity document. The matter remains one of statutory interpretation that the Court has yet to settle finally.

Due Process and Procedural Safeguards

The principle of natural justice is central. In Lal Babu Hussein v. Electoral Registration Officer (1995), the Court held that citizens cannot be deleted from rolls without notice and an opportunity to prove citizenship. The Hindu reports that new ERONET options allow Electoral Registration Officers to clear notices without hearings or documents. It also reports that over 350 electors in Delhi were marked “found ineligible”, and that officers say they have received no written instructions. Misuse of Form 7 adds to the concern. FIRs have been registered in Ballari, where over 7,500 deletions were sought, and in Vijayapura, where false death certificates were allegedly used. This shows that bulk deletion can be abused from several directions.

Accountability of the Election Commission

Article 324(5) makes the CEC as hard to remove as a Supreme Court judge. The Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968 lets the presiding officer of a House refuse to admit a motion, which can frustrate an impeachment attempt at the threshold. Section 16 of the 2023 Act gives protection for acts done in official capacity. Achary argues that this makes the Commission nearly unaccountable. The Constituent Assembly debates show that Dr. Ambedkar centralised the machinery precisely to prevent State-level manipulation of rolls. Comparative experience is relevant here. Independent electoral bodies such as South Africa’s IEC and Mexico’s INE rely on transparent decision rules and judicial review rather than immunity alone.

Institutional and Federal Dimensions

The episode has produced political counter-moves. The Keralam government’s order reviving a 2006 probe against the CEC, an Indo-Malaysian road project and a Malaysian engineer’s suicide, may be seen as legitimate scrutiny or as retaliation. The BJP, for its part, accuses opposition parties of trying to vitiate Delhi’s political atmosphere. A neutral reading suggests that perceived partisanship harms the credibility of every institution involved. The reported complaints by two Election Commissioners that they were not consulted raise a separate issue, namely collegial decision-making within the ECI.

Bihar Connection

Bihar was the first State to undergo SIR in 2025. The final roll published after that exercise reduced the electorate from its earlier size to roughly 7.4 crore. Bihar’s high rate of seasonal and long-term out-migration makes it especially vulnerable to “absent or shifted” classifications. In Patna, CPI(ML) Liberation’s Dipankar Bhattacharya has separately raised the Bihar Speaker’s inaction on a convicted BJP MLA. The case shows that institutional credibility in Bihar is being tested on more than one front.

Way Forward

Parliament should amend the RP Act to define SIR clearly, including its criteria, document list and timelines. All notice-disposal instructions should be published in writing. Mandatory notice and a reasoned hearing must precede any deletion, with an easily accessible appeal route. Booth-level agents’ bulk Form 7 filings should be capped and audited. Decision-making within the ECI should be collegial and recorded. Finally, the Supreme Court should expedite a final ruling so that rolls are settled well before the next elections.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

UPSC: GS-II (Constitutional bodies, electoral reforms, RP Acts, judiciary and executive relations); Essay (democracy and institutions). SSC: Articles 324 to 329, the Election Commission, the voting age, the CEC’s removal procedure. Key terms: SIR, Article 324(5), Section 21 RP Act 1950, Mohinder Singh Gill, Lal Babu Hussein, Anoop Baranwal, the 2023 CEC Act, Form 7, BLO, ERO, basic structure.