Karnataka SIR row intensifies: Minister Rizwan Arshad to flag ‘Form 7 misuse’

Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Minister Arshad is expected to demand immediate corrective measures from the Election Commission, including stricter scrutiny of Form 7 applications and safeguards to prevent deletion of valid voters from the roll. He represents the Shivajinagar constituency in Bengaluru Urban district.

The development comes amid allegations that a few people applied for mass deletion of voters in various constituencies across the state. Karnataka Congress president B K Hariprasad recently said that attempts were made to delete genuine voters in various constituencies across the state, including Bableshwar (Vijayapura district), Bhalki (Bidar district), Mudigere (Chikkamagaluru district), and Malleshwaram (Bengaluru Urban), among others. In some constituencies, various individuals withdrew Form 7s after officials threatened legal action for submitting them fraudulently.

JD(S) concerns

Concerns are rising within the National Democratic Alliance (NDA)camp, particularly following reports of large-scale applications to remove voters from the list in at least four constituencies. Leaders of the JD(S), an ally of the BJP, have reportedly raised concerns that the “West Bengal model” of voter deletions is being implemented in Karnataka.

October 15 is the deadline to dispose of claims and objections in Karnataka’s SIR process.

Before the SIR process began, Karnataka had 5.54 crore voters. Of them, around 1 crore were removed from the electoral roll during the enumeration phase, as they were classified under the Absent, Shifted, Dead, Deleted and Others category. Of the roughly 4.4 crore voters who made it to the draft roll, officials served notices to 43.81 lakh. If 20-25 per cent, or 9-11 lakh voters, don’t make it back, as officials suspect, Karnataka’s total electorate would shrink from 5.54 crore to around 4.35 crore.