The special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar will disenfranchise about 94 lakh voters, the Association for Democratic Rights has told the Supreme Court.
It has also alleged that the electoral registration officers (EROs) have been uploading the enumeration forms of voters who never filled them in or signed them — implying that it opens the door to the possible inclusion of ineligible voters.
It added that even the enumeration forms of dead people were being uploaded on the Election Commission website.
The ADR, a civil liberties organisation, is one of the main petitioners to have challenged the poll panel’s decision to conduct the SIR, which many civil society bodies and Opposition parties fear will disenfranchise large numbers of the poor, socially marginalised and less educated.
In July 2025, Bihar’s adult population was projected at 8.18 crore, the ADR said, which means the draft electoral rolls should have 8.18 crore names.
However, according to the poll panel, the number of voters to be included in the draft rolls currently stands at 7.24 crore, the ADR said in its affidavit, filed in opposition to the poll panel’s affidavit defending the SIR.
“Thus, there are 94 lakh adult persons (8.18 crore minus 7.24 crore) living in Bihar who should have been on (the) Electoral Roll(s) but whose names will not appear on the Draft Electoral Roll(s),” the ADR’s affidavit, filed through advocates Prashant Bhushan and Neha Rathi, said.
It alleged that the absence of defined procedures for the exercise had armed the EROs with unchecked discretion, which some of them were using in a manner “susceptible to misuse and (which) undermines the integrity of the electoral process and democracy”.
“It is submitted that a single ERO is tasked with handling the enumeration forms of over 3 lakh individuals, rendering it humanly impossible for any ERO to apply due diligence or conduct the process in a reasonable manner,” the ADR said.
It said enumeration forms were being mass-uploaded without the knowledge or consent of the voters for the EROs to achieve the unrealistic target set by the poll panel.
Many voters have been reported as saying their formshave been submitted online despite their never having met any booth-level officer (BLO) or signed any documents. Forms of even dead people have been submitted, reports have said.
“The situation raises serious questions about transparency, accountability, and the potential for electoral fraud, as voters express confusion and concern over how their details were uploaded without their involvement,” the ADR complained.
It said that unless the SIR order is set aside, the exercise can arbitrarily and without due process disenfranchise lakhs of citizens.
The ADR has also underlined that the SIR process began on June 25 and that the final electoral rolls are to be published on September 30, leaving only 97 days for the huge exercise. This itself puts large numbers of voters atthe risk of disenfranchisement, it said.
Many Opposition parties and civil rights groups had also objected from the beginning to the poll panel’s decision to keep Aadhaar, ration cards and voter I-cards outside the list of the 11 categories of documents required to prove citizenship.
The apex court on July 10 issued a notice to the poll panel in connection with the batch of petitions, and asked it to consider allowing these three documents as valid proof of citizenship for the purposes of the SIR.
In its July 21 affidavit, the poll panel acknowledged that it had not entirely precluded the use of Aadhaar or ration cards as identity and citizenship proof.
Amit Malviya, in-charge of the BJP’s national information and technology department and co-incharge of Bengal, wrote on X: “After Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee quotes a report by Human Rights Watch, an NGO heavily funded by George Soros, now ADR moves the Supreme Court expressing doubts over the Election Commission’s SIR process.
“What’s the common thread? ADR has received massive funding from the Omidyar Network andFord Foundation — both known for financing political influence operations across developing democracies. Omidyar has co-funded several institutions alongside Soros’s Open Society Foundation. Make no mistake — this is not dissent, this is subversion,” he wrote.
He said that this is not just politics, “this is a well-orchestrated foreign interference campaign to destabilise Bharat from within”.