Unkind cuts: On the Telangana and Karnataka electoral rolls

The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process, initiated by the Election Commission of India (ECI), has resulted in the removal of nearly a fifth of electoral rolls in Telangana and Karnataka, with the highest figures among the country. This disenfranchisement is most severe in the capital cities, with Bengaluru losing more than half of electors in five constituencies, while Hyderabad’s nine of its 15 constituencies have seen deletions exceeding 40%.

These cuts cannot merely be considered as trimming of excess names; they suggest that the ECI's own reduction processes led to bloated rolls in recent elections, particularly in regions with high migration from other parts of India. Moreover, there is no evidence to support the claim that those deleted actually left the State, as this would only relocate their names on the same State roll.

Recent data and government population estimates do not corroborate these deletions, possibly due to the voter ID's limited utility. The case for the Southern States may be further complicated by the voters' reluctance to engage in a process where their ID is only useful once in a few years. The ECI's lack of transparency, including failure to publish the elector-to-population ratio for any State, has made verifying these deletions challenging.

Furthermore, the Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer has not released a gender-wise breakdown of the deletions, which has made the verification process difficult. The consequences of this opacity were seen in West Bengal, where the ECI's "logical discrepancy" process disenfranchised lakhs of electors, who had to appeal to tribunals for restoration.

Months after the elections, only about 82,000 out of nearly 38 lakh appeals have been decided, with over 90% of these decisions favoring electors seeking reinstatement. The ECI, once a model for democratization in India, is now undermining the universal adult franchise.