Bengaluru electorate falls 43.13pc to 59.08 lakh after SIR

Bengaluru’s final electoral roll lists 59.08 lakh voters after the Special Intensive Revision, with officials reporting substantial changes across constituencies. The Chief Electoral Officer says no eligible voter was arbitrarily deleted and confirms fewer than 1,000 foreigners were identified

Bengaluru: Bengaluru’s electorate, which stood at 1.03 crore before the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) began, has declined by 43.13 per cent to 59.08 lakh following the publication of the final electoral roll on October 27.

Following the SIR, a total of 59,08,151 voters fall under the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA). Of them, 28.67 lakh are men, 30.40 lakh are women and 674 belong to the ‘others’ category.

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Of the total 59.08 lakh voters, Bengaluru Urban has 24.01 lakh, BBMP North has 13.25 lakh, BBMP South has 11.13 lakh, BBMP Central has 10.67 lakh and Bengaluru Rural has 8.04 lakh.

According to official data, 46.88 lakh names were listed under the ASDDO (Absent, Shifted, Dead, Duplicate and Others) category across 28 Assembly constituencies within the GBA limits in the final electoral roll. Of these, 7.27 lakh were marked absent, 32.74 lakh as permanently shifted, 3.19 lakh as dead and 63,549 as already enrolled (duplicate).

Among Bengaluru’s Assembly constituencies, the ASDDO status report showed that Bengaluru South recorded the highest number of deletions, at 3.63 lakh, followed by Mahadevapura with 2.96 lakh, Bommanahalli with 2.65 lakh and K R Puram with 2.58 lakh. These constituencies are currently represented by BJP MLAs.

Last year, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi had alleged the large-scale inclusion of fake voters in Mahadevapura’s electoral rolls ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The data also showed that Shivajinagar, a constituency with a considerable minority population, saw 81,236 voters deleted.

Bengaluru South, which recorded the highest number of deletions, also had the highest number of voters, at over 4.41 lakh. Rajajinagar had the lowest electorate, at over 1.13 lakh, following the SIR exercise.

According to the GBA, compared with the draft electoral roll, 2.74 lakh voters were newly added to the final roll within the GBA limits. Details of 1,81,053 voters were modified, while 65,881 names were deleted.

As a result, the final electoral roll recorded a net increase of 2.08 lakh voters compared with the draft roll, the GBA stated.

An analysis of district-wise data showed that Belagavi, which had the highest number of electors at 41.07 lakh before the SIR began, now has 36.35 lakh. Bengaluru Urban’s electorate declined from 40.21 lakh to 24.01 lakh, while Mysuru’s fell from 27.99 lakh to 22.80 lakh.

However, these three districts continue to have the highest number of electors, in the same order, following the SIR.

Addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer V Anbukkumar assured voters that no one had been deleted merely because a Form 7 application was submitted in bulk.

He said not a single eligible voter had been deleted and that applications submitted through Form 6 had been verified, with eligible applicants included in the electoral roll.

“There should be no confusion or apprehension that eligible voters have been left out arbitrarily. The process has been conducted transparently and in accordance with the law,” the CEO had said.

Responding to a question about the number of foreigners identified in the state during the SIR, he said, “Yes, we have detected foreigners. Their number is definitely less than 1,000.” According to sources, most of the foreigners marked for deletion from the electoral rolls were reportedly from Nepal.

He said the publication of the final electoral roll did not bring the revision process to an end, as electoral rolls are continuously updated.