Assam Opposition sniffs BJP plot to exclude voters from electoral roll

Leaders of the Congress and five other political parties on Sunday (January 25, 2026) submitted a memorandum to Assam’s Chief Electoral Officer, alleging that fake objections were being filed to remove unsuspecting voters from the draft electoral roll during the Special Revision (SR) exercise under way in the State.

According to the draft electoral roll published on December 27, 2025, Assam has 2.51 crore voters after 4.78 lakh were marked dead and 5.23 lakh were found shifted, while 53,619 multiple entries were deleted. The poll authorities claimed 100% verification covering more than 61 lakh households.

The Opposition parties — Congress, Raijor Dal, Assam Jatiya Parishad, Communist Party of India, CPI (Marxist), and CPI (Marxist–Leninist) — alleged widespread legal violations, political interference, and targeted harassment of genuine voters during the SR exercise, which they claimed was “arbitrary, unlawful, and unconstitutional”.

Their memorandum accused election officials at multiple levels of flouting statutory provisions under the Representation of the People Act, 1950, the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, the Manual on Electoral Rolls, 2023, and specific Election Commission of India (EC) directives issued on November 17, 2025.

The Opposition parties claimed that massive, illegal bulk objections were filed during the claims and objections phase of the SR from December 27, 2025, to January 22, mostly on grounds of death or permanent shifting of voters.

They said the Electoral Registration Officers should have summarily rejected the objections without issuing notices, as it was “beyond belief” that so many voters could have died or shifted residence within a short span. Yet, notices without stating the grounds of objections were issued to the targeted voters in violation of Rule 17 of the Registration of Electoral Rules, 1960.

‘Objectors unaware’

The parties alleged that large numbers of fake objections were filed without the knowledge of the listed objectors. “Several objectors of such fake objections have come forward to declare that they had no knowledge about the filing of the objections, and their EPIC numbers and mobile (phone) numbers were used by unknown persons for filing the objections,” the memorandum read.

They expressed concern over genuine voters, who have been victims of eviction, being deprived of filing or submitting Form 8, offline or online, due to the shifting of residence. They said this was part of a plan to remove such people from the final electoral rolls to be published on February 10.

In the memorandum, they cited the case of BJP leaders having taken over the election office in Boko under the Samaria Assembly constituency “to carry out suo motu deletion of voters’ names”. They also claimed that several Booth Level Officers have alleged coercion or misuse of their signatures for the “deletion drive”.

The Opposition parties also cited a public statement by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, asserting that the government “will do some utpaat [disturbance] within the ambit of the law” to keep Miyas under pressure by issuing notices to them during the SR exercise.

Such an “arbitrary, malafide, and unconstitutional” statement “reveals a predetermined intent to target a specific community and undermines the neutrality of the electoral process”, the Opposition parties said.

They urged the Chief Electoral Officer to summarily reject illegal and bulk objections without harassing voters, take action against those who filed fraudulent objections, prevent deletions by officials, allow the eviction-affected voters to file Form 8, bar political functionaries from influencing election offices, initiate administrative action against erring officials, and register FIRs against three BJP leaders in Boko under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.