BENGALURU: A day after the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced that the third phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) will be conducted in 16 states and three UTs, including Karnataka, Chief Electoral Officer, Karnataka, V Anbukumar, on Friday, said that issuance of notice does not mean deletion of names, and neither is it a legal notice.
Explaining the exercise, the CEO said that notice is a method of communication with the elector to submit details to the election officials for verification. Citizens must participate in the SIR exercise as the purpose is to include names of all eligible voters, he said. “If some citizens have their names in multiple locations, they must ensure their names and details are included in the electoral rolls from one place,” he said.
Anbukkumar said that notices will be issued only when electors’ previous SIR electoral rolls are not available or do not match with the database. “Voters will have to submit identity and domicile proof apart from Aadhaar. The list of documents required are listed in the enumeration form. After the mapping of voters, the enumeration forms will be generated. Each voter will get two sets of personalised, partially pre-filled forms to fill and verify,” he elaborated.
As of May 13, 86.46% of the 5,55,67,598 electors in Karnataka have been mapped in Karnataka (4,79,46,884).
“SIR exercise will start from June 30. So there is still time to complete the mapping exercise. If citizens have not been mapped, they can inform the CEO’s office or the Booth Level Officers (BLOs). An inquiry will be initiated against the BLO if any voter is missed during the mapping or enumeration exercise. Even if an elector fills out the forms online, the BLOs will visit their home for verification.
Each BLO will visit the house of the electors thrice to ensure that they are included. Citizens must participate in the exercise,” he said, adding that there are 59,050 BLOs in the state and 25,284 Booth Level Agents (BLAs) deployed by recognised political parties. Letters have been sent to political parties to appoint more BLAs for the SIR exercise, he added.
BLAs can accompany BLOs during the door-to-door verification of the electors, scheduled to be held from June 30 to September 7, he said and added that a request has also been made to the State Government to fill up the post to appoint 16 Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and 24 assistant EROs.
The CEO added that for further assistance of electors, voter facilitation centres are being set up at the panchayat and ward level, where electors can approach for any assistance, including checking their 2002 SIR details, he said.
“BLOs have to visit the house of every elector with enumeration forms. The address being referred for verification is based on the 2025 electoral rolls. The details of each voter are being verified and compared with the 2002 SIR,” Anbukkumar added.
The Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) exercise will go on in parallel.
But the annual revision exercise will be temporarily halted till the SIR is completed. Along with the enumeration form, the BLOs will also carry Form 6, to include new eligible voters, as on October 1, in the electoral rolls.