Why SY Quraishi has questions on basic premise and legal standing of SIR

Over 54 per cent of Delhi’s voters—ranging from ordinary residents in demolished settlements to high-profile figures, including the sitting and a former chief minister, former chief justices, and even a top Election Commission (EC) official—find themselves placed under doubt, notice, or outright deletion lists.

Speaking on The Federal’s special programme AI with Sanket, former Chief Election Commissioner SY Quraishi questioned the basic premise and legal standing of the SIR exercise. He noted that while Article 326 of the Constitution guarantees every citizen the right to be registered as a voter, the term “Special Intensive Revision” exists neither in the Constitution, not the Representation of the People Act, 1950, nor the Electoral Rules of 1960. Under Section 23(2) of the 1950 Act, only localized “intensive revisions” are permitted based on explicit, written justification, making a sweeping, arbitrary drive across millions of electors legally suspect.

Can EC guarantee transparency?

Recalling the origins of the SIR drive in Bihar, Quraishi pointed out that the exercise was initially justified as a measure to identify illegal immigrants. However, after subjecting 8 crore citizens to intense bureaucratic hurdles and electoral dislocation, official records reportedly indicated that only 500 non-citizens were identified, including 350 Nepali Hindu women who had migrated through marriage. Despite this negligible outcome, millions of voters were left off the electoral rolls during the elections, with no public accountability or official data released to clarify the discrepancy.

Also read: Delhi SIR: Kharge calls it 'Frankenstein Monster'; Congress says 'MODI at work'

Quraishi emphasized that ensuring the purity of electoral rolls has been a continuous annual process for 75 years through summary revisions. For over two decades, computerization allowed Booth Level Officers (BLOs) to perform door-to-door verification, updating records for deaths and migrations without dismantling the entire database. He challenged the EC to provide a sworn affidavit certifying that updated rolls are completely free of illegal deletions, rather than shifting the burden of proof onto legitimate citizens.

The West Bengal case

The flawed mechanics of the revision were vividly demonstrated in West Bengal, where tens of lakhs of electors were initially excluded prior to assembly polls. Subsequent tribunal adjudications revealed that over 91 per cent of appealed exclusions were legitimate voters who had been wrongly denied their franchise. Quraishi argued that when tens of thousands of voters are improperly deleted in constituencies decided by narrow margins of a few thousand votes, the electoral outcomes are fundamentally vitiated and warrant fresh elections.

The exercise has produced even more absurd results in major urban centres like Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Chennai. While metropolitan areas typically experience net immigration due to economic opportunities, SIR procedures have recorded massive emigration figures without corresponding additions anywhere else in the country. Quraishi warned that treating dead or relocated electors as “bogus” voters conflates routine administrative reporting gaps with systemic fraud, creating widespread disenfranchisement.

VIPs under scrutiny

The crisis escalated significantly in Delhi, where the EC flagged 54 per cent of the electorate—comprising deletions, notice issuances, and alleged logical discrepancies. High-profile figures caught in the net included former Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, Election Commissioner Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, former Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani, sitting Chief Minister Rekha Gupta, and former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Also read: Months after Bengal SIR, BLOs await dues; no ex-gratia for kin of dead

While the EC issued unprecedented public clarifications for VIP voters and instructed BLOs to safeguard top dignitaries in their areas, Quraishi highlighted that ordinary citizens enjoy no such protections. He noted that forcing citizens into long queues to prove their nationality inversionally flips constitutional mandates. To resolve the institutional deadlock, Quraishi suggested that the Supreme Court declare post-January 2025 SIR actions null and void, restoring the 2025 electoral rolls as the base for standard summary revisions.

Were 2025 polls done on defective rolls?

Echoing these concerns, activist Anjali Bhardwaj pointed out that numerical data provided by the EC itself highlights internal contradictions within the process. Delhi possessed 1.56 crore voters during the February 2025 elections that formed the local government. Yet, between pre-SIR deletions (11 lakh), initial phase removals (47 lakh), and recent flagging (33 lakh), nearly 91 lakh electors—representing roughly 60 per cent of the electorate—have been placed in jeopardy.

“Either the February 2025 elections were held on a deeply defective roll, rendering the government’s mandate invalid, or this SIR drive is a complete administrative fraud,” Bhardwaj argued. She stressed that the EC only published the list of notice recipients after activists petitioned the Supreme Court, revealing that arbitrary criteria were being weaponized against citizens under the label of “logical discrepancies”.

Absurd guidelines

Among the arbitrary guidelines used to flag voters are administrative rules marking individuals who have six or more siblings, or those with an age gap of less than 15 years with a parent. Bhardwaj criticized these benchmarks as legally baseless under the Representation of the People Act, pointing out that large family sizes and early marriages were standard historical realities that do not negate an individual’s citizenship or residency rights.

Also read: ‘Shah Instigated Removal’ of voters: Cong flags large-scale voter deletions in SIR

The impact is most devastating on marginalized urban populations living in informal settlements such as Bela Estate, Madrasi Colony, and Jailer Wala Bagh. Following slum demolitions, BLOs visiting these sites routinely deleted residents simply because physical structures were absent. Deprived of voter cards, displaced residents are rendered ineligible for rehabilitation housing schemes, trapping them in a vicious cycle of disenfranchisement and socio-economic exclusion.

No justification

Bhardwaj revealed that official Right to Information (RTI) responses from the EC’s principal secretary confirmed that no formal internal records or EC decisions exist to justify initiating a 100-crore voter SIR exercise. This lack of documentation raises severe questions regarding whether the drive originated from external executive pressure, such as the Ministry of Home Affairs or the Prime Minister’s Office, thereby compromising institutional independence.

To reclaim their voting rights, deleted citizens are routinely forced to submit Form 6—a declaration reserved exclusively for first-time voters—effectively coercing individuals into making false statements under oath. Bhardwaj characterized this procedure as institutional “dadagiri”, designed to harass vulnerable citizens rather than maintain pure electoral rolls.

Threat to trust

Both Quraishi and Bhardwaj emphasized that when electoral rolls are selectively manipulated, democratic outcomes are determined prior to the casting of ballots. “If you remove voters who are going to vote for one political party and leave others, you effectively don’t even need elections,” Bhardwaj declared.

Also read: Mass voter deletions during SIR: ‘Not voters’ responsibility to prove they are voters’

They warned that the current trajectory threatens to permanently erode public faith in India’s election machinery and called upon the judiciary to strike down arbitrary revision parameters to safeguard constitutional democracy.