Telangana SIR: 73.39 lakh voters excluded from draft electoral rolls

A total of 73.39 lakh voters have been excluded from Telangana’s draft electoral rolls, while around 92 lakh electors will receive notices over anomalies and unmapped records as part of the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.

Hyderabad: A staggering 73.39 lakh voters have been excluded from the draft electoral rolls published on Monday, while 92 lakh electors will be served notices as part of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Telangana.

As per the information released by the Telangana Chief Electoral Office, 73,39,235 voters have been identified under the Absent, Shifted and Death (ASD) category. Of these, 9,22,229 electors are categorised as dead, 11,25,546 are absent or untraceable, 45,18,963 have permanently shifted, 6,70,203 are already enrolled and 1,02,294 are categorised under other categories.

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Telangana CEO C Sudarshan Reddy said the BLOs did not find these electors or did not receive their enumeration forms as they had become electors in other States/UTs, were not found at their given addresses, did not submit the forms until the August 10 deadline, or were not willing to register as electors for some or other reason.

However, genuine electors could still be added back to the electoral rolls during the claims and objections period between August 17 and September 16 using Form-6 along with the prescribed declaration form, he said.

As the enumeration form submission deadline concluded on August 10, 2,64,87,213 out of 3,38,26,448 electors submitted their forms. However, the Telangana CEO identified anomalies, including mismatch of names and incorrect age between the present and last SIR, in the forms submitted by 60,50,918 voters, while 32,36,659 electors could not be mapped with the SIR 2002 list. These numbers reveal that only 1,71,99,636 voters submitted enumeration forms, including mapping with the SIR 2002 list, correctly in the State.

Among the districts, Hyderabad has the highest number of voters, 6,72,678, with anomalies, followed by 5,60,201 in Ranga Reddy, 3,91,453 in Nizamabad, 3,47,682 in Sangareddy and 3,34,252 in Medchal-Malkajgiri district. Similarly, 10,72,599 in Medchal-Malkajgiri, 6,72,979 in Rangareddy and 5,80,908 electors in Hyderabad could not be mapped with the SIR 2002 list.

Given the anomalies and unmapped voters, notices will be served by the Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and Assistant EROs through the Booth Level Officers and/or registered post to the house addresses of the voters from August 17 to September 16.

Reddy said electors who receive notices could submit their replies, along with necessary documents, to the BLOs, AEROs or EROs. “Presently, the hearing phase cannot be ruled out. The EROs or AEROs may call electors for a hearing if they need additional information based on the details submitted in response to the notice,” he said.

A total of 119 EROs and 892 AEROs have been put in place for the notice and disposal of claims and objections phase, which is scheduled from August 17 to October 15, and the final electoral roll will be published on October 19.

“We will seek additional staff to the tune of 1,000 during this phase. If we could not complete the process in time, we will seek ECI permission to extend the schedule,” he added.