The Congress has accused the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise of disenfranchising voters, amid controversy over 33.13 lakh notices issued in Delhi over discrepancies in details submitted in enumeration forms.
Most of the notices reportedly relate to voter details that do not match information recorded during the previous SIR of electoral rolls in 2002.
Congress general secretary in charge of communications Jairam Ramesh, responding to a post highlighting the inclusion of the late economist Bibek Debroy’s name among those issued notices, said: “Actually at work here is a Method Of Disenfranchising Indians.” He arranged the phrase vertically so that the initial letters spell “MODI”.
The remarks came a day after the Congress alleged that the ongoing SIR exercise was resulting in large-scale deletions. The party described the process as a “Shah Instigated Removal” of voters and called it an “assault on the Constitution”.
The Congress has also claimed that the deletions disproportionately affect voters from economically and socially disadvantaged sections of society.
According to Ramesh, Phase 1 of the SIR began in Bihar in June 2025, while Phase 2 was launched in November 2025 across nine states and three Union territories. He said 7.8 crore names were deleted during the first two phases, amounting to around 13 per cent of the pre-SIR electoral roll.
Phase 3 began in mid-2026 across 16 states and three Union territories. Ramesh said that, according to data from 12 states and two Union territories, 6.18 crore names had been deleted from a total electorate of 36.06 crore.
Opposition parties have alleged that the SIR is being used to target voters who do not support the BJP and its allies. The Election Commission, however, has maintained that the exercise, being conducted after 22 years, is intended to remove ineligible and duplicate entries and ensure that all eligible voters are included in the electoral rolls.
(With inputs from PTI)