Bhubaneswar, 05 July (H.S.): More than 20 lakh names have been removed from Odisha's draft electoral roll as part of the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) R.S. Gopalan announced on Sunday.

Addressing the media, Gopalan said that 20.14 lakh ineligible entries have been deleted from the draft electoral roll following the revision process. After the update, Odisha now has 3.13 crore registered voters.

He said that the primary objective of the SIR exercise is to ensure the accuracy and integrity of the electoral roll by removing ineligible names while ensuring that no eligible voter is left out.

“The objective of this SIR is ‘No eligible elector to be left behind, no ineligible person to be included.’ We organized voter camps across the state and completed the training and capacity building of supervisors and Booth Level Officers (BLOs) to carry out the exercise effectively,” Gopalan said.

The CEO appealed to all voters to verify whether their names appear in the draft electoral roll. Electors can check their status by contacting their respective Booth Level Officers (BLOs) through the Call the BLO feature available on the Election Commission's mobile application, or by visiting the official websites voters.eci.gov.in and ceoodisha.nic.in.

Gopalan assured that adequate safeguards have been put in place to protect genuine voters. If an eligible person's name has been deleted inadvertently, they can apply for restoration through the prescribed procedure. Such applications will be examined by election authorities before a final decision is taken.

The Election Commission has urged all eligible voters to verify their electoral details at the earliest and, if necessary, complete the required formalities to ensure their names are included in the final electoral roll.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Monalisa Panda