Bihar: EC makes public names of 65 lakh deleted voters, INDIA bloc calls it 'farce'

Patna, Aug 18 (PTI) The Election Commission on Monday said it has made public the names of nearly 65 lakh people, which were deleted from the draft electoral rolls published in Bihar as part of the special intensive revision (SIR).

In pursuance of the Supreme Court order last week, the EC made available the names, booth wise, on its website, besides putting up printouts at each polling station.

A statement issued by Bihar CEO Vinod Singh Gunjiyal said, "In light of the interim order passed by the Supreme Court on August 14, 2025... it is hereby notified that the list of such electors whose names were included in the Electoral Roll of the year 2025 (before the draft publication) but are not included in the draft roll published on August 1, along with reasons (Deceased/Permanently Shifted/Absent/Repeated Entry), has been published on the websites of the Chief Electoral Officer, Bihar, and all district election officers of Bihar." All such electors, whose names are not included in the draft roll, may obtain information about their entry and the reasons thereof by using their EPIC number in the published list, he said.

In the draft electoral rolls published on August 9, 22.34 lakh names had been dropped with the claim that the persons concerned were dead, while another 36.28 lakh were knocked off as they were said to have permanently migrated. In addition, 7.01 lakh people were said to have not been found at their registered addresses and hence their names were deleted.

A number of petitions have been filed in the apex court challenging the SIR, which is being carried only in the state where assembly polls are due in a couple of months, and one of the contentions of the petitioners was that names were deleted in a non-transparent manner.

The publication of what the EC describes as 'ASD' (absent, shifted, dead) lists, however, seems to have cut little ice with opposition parties in the state that have been alleging that SIR was aimed at "helping" the BJP-led NDA in elections.

State Congress spokesperson Asit Nath Tiwari told PTI, "The manner in which the lists have been published is tantamount to ridiculing the Supreme Court judgment. From day one, we have been demanding a consolidated, state-wide list of the names that have been included as well as the ones that have been deleted. Today's exercise is a farce that addresses none of our concerns." "You go to the EC website and you will be asked to either search your details through your EPIC number, which may be useful only for individual voters, or to go to choose a specific booth in an assembly constituency, which the political parties need. Why are they not providing a list of deletions for the entire state? Perhaps because they want to hide the scale at which irregularities have taken place," he said.

Tiwari's contention comes in the backdrop of several instances coming to light in which people declared dead have been found to be alive. A few such persons were produced before the Supreme Court, triggering an angry outburst from the EC's counsel, who accused the petitioners of "indulging in a drama" instead of helping the voters get their names re-entered in the voters' list.

CPI(ML) Liberation state secretary Kunal, whose party boss Dipankar Bhattacharya is one of the petitioners, feels that the onus of restoring the wrongfully deleted names in the final electoral rolls, to be published next month, should be on the EC.

"We had visited the office of the chief electoral officer last week along with Bhojpur resident Mintu Paswan (41), whose name was deleted as the BLO concerned had counted him as among the dead. When the CEO called up the BLO, the latter said he was misinformed by neighbours of Paswan," said Kunal.

"I pointed out to the CEO that in no way could any mistake on the part of Paswan be blamed for the deletion. So, why is he being asked to go through the rigour of filling up a form and submitting it with a photograph and other documents? The EC can atone for its sin by taking responsibility for the lapse and restoring his name unconditionally. Of course, this rubbed the official the wrong way and he retorted that I was being illogical," he added.

Echoing a view expressed by Tiwari, Kunal said, "If logicality is something the EC cares for, then what is the logic behind not making available a consolidated ASD list? It would have enabled political parties like us to detect problems in a more efficient manner." Bihar has more than 90,000 polling booths. Booth-wise publication of the lists can be anything but an attempt to make things easier for aggrieved voters, he said.

"We wonder if the EC has forgotten that the poll schedule has to be announced in about a month from now," he added.

The booth-wise ASD lists run into 10 columns, meant for details like name, age and EPIC number of the voter whose name was deleted.

The last column states 'mrit' (dead), 'sthanantarit' (shifted), or 'anupasthit' (absent), as the case may be. There are also separate columns giving details of the person whom the BLO happened to meet and relationship with the one whose name was deleted. PTI PKD NAC ACD