Delhi SIR: 11.9 lakh voters marked for exclusion as roll revision gathers pace

To give more time to BLOs to complete their work, the Election Commission of India (ECI) — two weeks back — had even extended timelines for various phases of the SIR. Twelve days are left to finish the current phase of the SIR, in which more than 13,000 BLOs are conducting house to house visits to distribute enumeration forms to electors who will fill out their details as per the last SIR in 2002 till August 8. At 1.53 lakh, the South district tops the districts in the Capital with most exclusions so far. Next is South East with 1.18 lakh electors excluded.

According to official data from the CEO office, as of 8 pm on Monday, 99.8% of the enumeration forms had been distributed to electors and 50.07% had been returned by them and digitised by BLOs. At 36.39%, South East district is the worst performing district in digitising enumeration forms so far. East district has digitised 41.60% and South has digitised 43.07% enumeration forms.

The best performing districts, so far, are Outer North at 62.82% and Southwest at 60.42%.

“Delhi has a lot of migrant labourers, government servants and private white collar professionals — all of whom move a lot and don’t get their addresses updated… This is why, the deletions may be more than 30%,” an official from the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Delhi said. Neighbouring Gurgaon, where the enumeration exercise just got over last week, also saw 29% of the electors getting excluded — the highest in Haryana. The Delhi CEO office did not respond to queries in this regard.

On exclusions, another election official said that people are not willing to fill out enumeration forms themselves. “So many electors are asking their BLOs to fill out their complete forms, even when they are educated,” the official said.

“Regular meetings are being held to review progress in all districts. Special camps
are also being set up, and additional BLOs have also been deployed where necessary,” the official said.

Meanwhile, the AAP has raised questions over the ongoing exercise. “The BJP government’s claims on SIR are completely false. The government is saying that 99% of the forms have been distributed, which is entirely wrong,” AAP Delhi unit chief Saurabh Bharadwaj alleged at a press conference on Monday, saying that nearly 50% of people in unauthorised colonies say that they haven’t received the SIR form.

The draft electoral roll in the Capital will be published on August 17. Claims and objections can be filed between August 17 and September 16. The disposal of claims and objections will stretch until October 15. The final electoral roll will be published on October 19.