Tamil Nadu voter list revision to begin in a week
What's the story
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has informed the Madras High Court that a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Tamil Nadu will start within a week. The announcement was made before Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and Justice G Arul Murugan during the hearing of a petition by former AIADMK MLA B Sathyanarayanan.
Allegations
Former MLA seeks re-verification of electoral rolls
Sathyanarayanan, who represented the T Nagar constituency from 2016 to 2021, had moved the court seeking a complete re-verification of electoral rolls for all 229 parts of his constituency. He alleged that he conducted a door-to-door inspection of 100 booths and discovered duplicate/double entries, non-resident voters, and deceased voters on the rolls. The former MLA argued these discrepancies led to his defeat in the 2021 elections by just 137 votes due to mass deletion of genuine voters.
Assurance
ECI assures court all directions will be followed
Niranjan Rajagopalan, standing counsel for the ECI, assured the court that all directions issued by the Supreme Court in a similar case in Bihar would be followed during this revision. He said consultations with Chief Electoral Officers have already been held. The court took note of the submissions and adjourned the hearing on Sathyanarayanan's petition for a week, giving him time to submit additional documents.
SIR
Pan-India SIR soon
Per reports, the pan-India SIR of electoral registers is expected to be conducted in two phases, with the first phase focusing on the four poll-bound states of Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and West Bengal, as well as the Union Territory of Puducherry. The remaining states are slated to participate in the second phase, with a schedule set to be released next week.