1 crore Tamil Nadu voters could become living dead: Kamal Haasan on SIR

Haasan was referring to the ongoing process of EC using a centralised software to generate notices to electors based on five categories of “logical discrepancies” submitted in their documents. This includes a spelling mismatch.

“We just want to cast our vote. Spelling mistakes are a curse only for languages. Modern literature forgives these in favour of content, as does the internet. The Election Commission obviously does not. EC does not mean English coaches. As it is, Bihar has become a land of many living dead. We don’t want this disease to spread across the country…EC is surely facilitating the spread of this disease. We fear that there could soon be nearly 1 crore living dead on paper in Tamil Nadu,” he said.

He urged the House to act immediately, adding that the “juggernaut called democratic India will roll on”.

The draft roll published in December showed a deletion of 97 lakh electors in Tamil Nadu who had been marked dead, shifted/absent or registered at some other place, after which another 1.70 crore electors were flagged for notices. The final electoral roll is to be published on February 14, and Assembly elections are due soon after.

Speaking in the discussion, former Prime Minister and Rajya Sabha MP HD Deve Gowda told the House that while the Opposition had been questioning Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his “silence”, it was this very silence that had the power to accomplish great things, citing the Indo-EU and Indo-US trade deals. He said that had the government compromised on the interest of the agriculture and dairy sectors, the JD (S) chief would have been the first to approach the PM. He ended his speech by calling for a solution to the drinking water problem in Karnataka.