Chennai, 24 October (H.S.) : The Election Commission of India (ECI) informed the Madras High Court on Friday that the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls across Tamil Nadu is scheduled to commence next week. This exercise is part of a nationwide process and is being initiated ahead of the Legislative Assembly elections slated for 2026 in the state.
The ECI's submission was made during the hearing of a petition filed by former AIADMK MLA, Sathyanarayanan. The plea alleged significant irregularities in the T Nagar voters' list, claiming that over 13,000 names of AIADMK supporters were deleted to benefit the DMK.
In response to this complaint, the ECI assured the High Court that Sathyanarayanan's specific allegations would be thoroughly examined as an integral part of the upcoming revision process. Following this assurance, the High Court directed the ECI to submit the Supreme Court's order related to the SIR case concerning Bihar.
The move to conduct the Special Intensive Revision in Tamil Nadu follows a similar exercise conducted by the ECI in Bihar earlier this year. During the Bihar revision, the ECI undertook a massive cleanup of the electoral rolls, resulting in the deletion of lakhs of names of voters who had either died, moved out of the state, or were otherwise missing from the rolls.
Conversely, the exercise also led to the addition of several lakh new voters, ensuring the rolls are updated and accurate. The upcoming revision in Tamil Nadu is expected to undertake a similar massive audit and update of the state's voter database.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Dr. R. B. Chaudhary
