The special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bengal was rolled out on November 4. There is an intrinsic difference between what the 2002 SIR intended to achieve and the objective of the present exercise.
The intensive revisions of electoral rolls conducted during 2002-2004 attempted to identify absent, shifted, dead or duplicate electors through house visits and search of electoral rolls — this was fairly straightforward. The SIR 2026 added the task of identifying foreigners.
Unlike previous cases, the SIR 2026 requires all electors to fill out an enumeration form and requires booth-level officers (BLOs) to collect the same within a stipulated time frame. Failure to submit the form on time would lead to at least the temporary exclusion of the elector’s name from the draft list.
Filling up the enumeration form is not easy. It requires downloading electoral rolls drawn up after the 2002 SIR and tracing the names of electors or their parents/grandparents — often a complex task as precise details of participation in the previous SIR may not be easily available.
Subsequently, the forms are uploaded. There could be errors when forms are filled up in regional languages. Finally, electors unable to establish the link with the previous SIR need to submit documents for the inclusion of their names in the final roll. This could be challenging for many.
Clearly, the addition of the task of detecting foreigners led to a manifold increase in the complexity of the exercise. The SIR 2026 requires serious involvement of the entire adult population in tasks like filling up forms and using technology. Tremendous time pressure, coupled with fear of exclusion for electors and punitive measures for BLOs, makes the job harder for everyone.
Evidently, the cost of conducting the SIR 2026 is far higher than the previous ones because of the inclusion of just one task — preventing the wrongful inclusion of foreigners’ names. It is, therefore, expected that the SIR 2026 would lead to the identification of a large number of foreigners.
In Bihar, 65 lakh and 3.66 lakh voters’ names were deleted from the draft and the final lists. The Election Commission of India did not publish the number of foreigners detected.
Yogendra Yadav, who appeared as a party–in–person in the Supreme Court to challenge the SIR process, highlighted that only 390 foreigners were detected. Even if we assume that the figure is 5,000, it translates to 0.07 per cent of the deletions, 0.007 per cent of the electorate and less than 21 ineligible electors per constituency — hardly a matter of concern. The SIR 2026 in Bihar seems to be akin to “a blind man, searching for a black cat, in a dark room, that is not there”, that too at a huge economic and social cost.
It is essential to know the number of foreigners detected in Bihar. Further, the ECI must have a reasonable estimate of the number of foreigners before taking up the SIR 2026 in other states. An exercise of such a huge cost, including inconvenience to the entire adult population, cannot be taken up based on anecdotal evidence alone.
The effectiveness of the SIR 2026 is questionable from at least two other perspectives.
First, in an article in The Indian Express on October 7, Yadav and Rahul Shastri estimated that initially 1,087 electors had been identified as foreigners, but during the scrutiny, the number came down to 390, pegging the error rate at 64 per cent. This is similar to a Covid-19 test, where only 36 out of every 100 persons declared to have Covid-19 actually have the disease. Such a test can hardly be relied upon. Thus, ECI must report the number of wrongly detected foreigners and review the detection methodology if the rate of wrong detection is high.
Second, many activities carried out by BLOs and individual electors could have been automated or eliminated. For example, all information regarding electors who have the same EPIC number as the last SIR is readily available. The same is true for electors whose names appear in the last SIR and EPICS were subsequently changed through Form-8. These electors do not need to submit any form. Children of these voters need to enter only a couple of EPIC numbers, rather than filling out complete forms.
Many of the 3.66 lakh electors’ names deleted during the preparation of the Bihar final roll were possibly duplicate entries. Much of this could have been eliminated through technology. Incorporating these and other improvement activities could reduce errors, the workload, and costs by 40-45 per cent or more.
In conclusion, attempts to detect foreigners made the SIR 2026 far more expensive than the previous SIRs, but its effectiveness is questionable. In Bihar, the number of foreigners detected appears to be negligible. The method of detecting foreigners also appears to be flawed.
Apparently, a reasonable estimate of the number of foreigners was not available and the exercise was probably based on anecdotal evidence. The data required to assess the effectiveness are not being shared. It also appears that there is much scope for improving the efficiency of the current process through judicious use of technology.
Overall, the SIR 2026 does not appear to provide any marginal benefit whatsoever over the previous SIRs. On the contrary, it appears to have a lower efficiency with far higher economic and social costs. Can we afford to bear such a huge cost without commensurate benefits?
- The author is a statistician and a former teacher of ISI, Calcutta