Don’t remove any genuine voter from electoral rolls, parliamentary committee tells EC

A Parliamentary Standing Committee has asked the Election Commission to ensure that no genuine elector is excluded from the voters’ lists or subjected to undue hardship during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), which has concluded in many States and will begin in others soon.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice in its report tabled in Parliament this week, has said that the revision of electoral rolls should be carried out in a fair, transparent and inclusive manner. It has sought adequate safeguards for vulnerable sections, including senior citizens, persons with disabilities, economically weaker sections, and migrant populations.

The committee’s recommendations come even as political parties in many States such as West Bengal have raised questions about the entire process and made allegations that the names of many genuine voters were deleted. While the SIR process has been completed in 11 States and Union Territories, the EC has asked 22 other States to begin preparations for the exercise.

The final electoral list of Uttar Pradesh is scheduled to be out in April. In West Bengal, names of around 60.06 lakh voters, whose details had “logical discrepancies”, are under adjudication by judicial officers. Those names cleared by the officers will be added to the voters’ list by way of a supplementary list.

Monitoring mechanism

The report submitted in Parliament on March 16 said: “The committee takes note of the proposed house-to-house verification by booth-level officers and the uploading of relevant documents on ECINET (Election Commission Integrated Network) with restricted access, as well as the involvement of political parties through booth-level agents”.

It therefore, recommends that the Election Commission of India put in place robust monitoring mechanisms at all levels to ensure uniform implementation of the revision process, while also ensuring strict adherence to data privacy and security protocols in respect of documents uploaded on ECINET.

“These measures, in the view of the committee, would help enhance transparency and strengthen public confidence in the integrity of the electoral rolls,” said the report by the multi-party panel, headed by senior BJP MP Brij Lal.