CHENNAI: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has included “Extract of the electoral roll of Bihar SIR with reference to July 1, 2025” in its list of 13 types of documents that can be submitted as proof of identity during scrutiny in the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Tamil Nadu and eight other states and three union territories.
The move has raised concerns among political parties in Tamil Nadu with the ruling DMK formally asking the ECI to clarify the inclusion of the document for the SIR in the state.
“Will the Bihar SIR be taken as a basic document to include voters of Bihar as voters of Tamil Nadu without there being any eligibility based on the criteria of ‘ordinary residence?,” the DMK asked in its submission to Chief Electoral Officer Archana Patnaik on Wednesday.
“What the electoral roll of Bihar has to do with the SIR to be conducted in Tamil Nadu has not been clarified,” the party said in its representation.
‘Bihar natives won’t automatically be added to TN electoral rolls’
However, an official from from the elections department in TN, on condition of anonymity, stressed that this was not a cause of concern as it was only one of the 13 documents. It was included for the verification of a person who wants to be on the electoral roll in TN as they are an ordinary resident here, although they hail from Bihar - the only state where SIR has been completed - the official said. This would not automatically mean the inclusion of Bihar natives living in TN in the electoral roll here, the official explained.
The NTK also raised the issue, alleging that this confirmed its suspicions that there are efforts to add migrant workers from northern states in TN’s electoral rolls.
Strongly opposing the inclusion of this document in the list, DMK’s legal wing secretary and MP NR Elango demanded that the ECI drop this item (Document 13) to avoid confusion among the people of TN regarding the SIR, which has already attracted several concerns.
“In Tamil Nadu, if you are a voter in 2002, there is no need for any identification document during the SIR. Your children also require no document. All others should produce any of the 13 identification documents to add them to the electoral rolls. There is no problem with the identification documents from 1 to 12.
But document 13 is a document related to a person’s identity as a voter in Bihar on the ground that the person is an ordinary resident of Bihar as on July 1, 2025. Within four or five months, how can the same person be an elector on the Tamil Nadu electoral rolls?” Elango asked.
VCK general secretary and MP D Ravikumar said that when a large chunk of voters were deleted in Bihar, the ECI attributed the deletions to migration of a large number of voters to TN, which surprised many as such persons could be working in other states as well.
“Now, adding the Bihar SIR extract as an identification document raises a suspicion as to whether this is an attempt to make Bihar workers as voters here,” he alleged. Ravikumar said during the 2002 SIR, the ECI did not demand such identification documents.
The senior elections department official, however, pointed out that “Document 13” has not been included just for TN, but for all nine states and three union territories undergoing the SIR. The official added that this would be useful to verify if a person is now an ordinary resident of TN, but their parents had their names in Bihar’s electoral rolls.
When the next phase of SIR takes place, the extract of SIRs from TN and remaining states that complete the process will also be added as identification documents for the remaining states, the official said, and emphasised that the SIR is a transparent process, subject to reviews at multiple levels even by political parties and hence no one can be added without thorough verification.
