MUMBAI: The draft electoral rolls released after the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) conducted across Maharashtra has seen 20.68 million electors, or 21.14%, dropped from the voters’ list across the state. In Mumbai, 34.75% names have been deleted, while the number is even higher for Thane district, where 38.37% voters have been dropped – the highest for any district in the state.
This constitutes the next phase of the SIR exercise. Voters whose names are missing from the draft rolls, those who require corrections and others who want to file objections must do this by September 30 along with supporting documents. The final electoral rolls will be published on November 4. Breaking down the figures, the office of the state chief electoral officer said that across Maharashtra, of the 97,854,049 registered voters, as many as 20,688,487 electors, or 21.14%, have been excluded from the draft electoral rolls who could not be traced at their given addresses during the SIR exercise.
Because they were registered at more than one polling booth, taking the number of actual exclusions from the draft rolls to over 19 million, not 20.68 million, this includes 1.76 million voters who were excluded. The figures were announced by the state chief electoral officer, who released the draft electoral rolls on Monday after completion of the enumeration phase of the SIR.
“The poll body has not provided us with full information about electors who have been deleted and those who are expected to receive notices. Most of the names deleted are from constituencies represented by opposition parties,” alleged Sandesh Kondvilkar, Mumbai Congress leader and the party’s SIR in-charge. Among those dropped, 7.68 million voters have permanently shifted, 7.55 million are absent from their given addresses, 3.48 million are deceased, 1.76 million were registered in more than one constituency, according to the state election office. Another 223,000 refused to register despite being found at their respective addresses. Political parties, however, contend that among the 77.16 million electors who have found their names in the draft, as many as 6.1 million were not mapped with their 2004 SIR records. “Many of them, as well as electors in the draft with anomalies in their names or age, are likely to be dropped from the final list if they fail to produce documents to prove their 2004 records for nationality or fail to rectify the anomalies by producing documents. The booth-level officers did not reach the homes of 92% of electors whose names have been deleted.
Because of the high floating population and number of migrants, “The percentage is high for Mumbai and other cities compared to rural areas.
“When one accounts for duplicate voters and deceased voters, the actual number excluded from the draft rolls drops to 15.6 million,” election officials said. Voters register themselves in new constituencies after shifting but do not delete their names in previous constituencies,” said an election official. This means more names are likely to be deleted when the final rolls are published after three months,” said a senior Congress leader from Maharashtra, The Opposition, however, has blamed the EC for a lack of transparency.
“Those who are in the ‘absent’ or ‘shifted’ voter category have a chance to add their names in the next phase, which started on Monday, by filing Form 6. They can find their names once the final electoral rolls are published in October.
Also, first-time voters who are now eligible can enrol as new voters,” he said. State chief electoral officer (CEO) S Chockalingam underlined that the list released on Monday was a draft electoral roll, not the final one.
