NEW DELHI: Clarifying further amid the raging uproar over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls ahead of upcoming Bihar assembly elections, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar on Tuesday said eligible citizens should register themselves as voters only in constituencies of which they are ‘ordinary residents’ and not the place ‘where they own a house’.
Addressing a group of booth-level officers here, the CEC said, “As per the Representation of the People Act, you are entitled to vote only in the assembly constituency where you are an ordinary resident. For example, if you ordinarily reside in Delhi but own a house in Patna, your vote should be registered in Delhi, not in Patna.”
Kumar’s remarks assumed greater significance in view of the poll panel’s exercise of SIR of electoral roll in Bihar, which is set to go for assembly election later this year.
According to Election Commission officials, the key objective of the SIR drive is to identify such people, who have, knowingly or unknowingly, managed to retain multiple voter cards for different constituencies.
There are many, who are ordinary residents of one place and have got their voter card from their current location and retained their earlier card from their past places before migration, which, the officials pointed out, “is a criminal offence”.
The opposition parties, both in Bihar and elsewhere, are criticising the SIR exercise saying this could deprive genuine voters of their right and benefit the ruling dispensation in the state.
The electoral rolls were prepared afresh through various intensive revisions, either across the country or in parts, nine times in the 52-year period from 1952 to 2004 - once nearly every six years on average, the officials said, adding that this time the exercise is taking place after 22 years.
The Commission will carry out an intensive review of electoral rolls this year in six states, beginning with Bihar, to weed out foreign illegal migrants by checking their place of birth.
Bihar is going to the polls later this year, while assembly elections in Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal are scheduled in 2026.
The move, which would be later expanded to other states, assumes significance in the wake of a crackdown in various states on illegal foreign migrants, including from Bangladesh and Myanmar.
The poll panel officials argued that the issue of many persons enrolling in different places by giving different unmatching details to procure more than one electoral photo identity card (EPIC) would be resolved through the SIR.