The Election Commission of India (ECI) has issued nearly 3,00,000 notices to voters in Bihar after serious discrepancies were found in their voter ID documents during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

According to ECI sources, during verification checks, officials discovered that nationals from Bangladesh, Nepal, Myanmar, and Afghanistan were holding Indian voter identity cards. These cases came to light during scrutiny carried out by Electoral Registration Officers (EROs).

"A thorough verification will be carried out between August 1 and 30, and names found not eligible will be excluded from the final voter list set to be published on September 30," an ECI source said.

Officials said that during house-to-house visits in Bihar, Booth Level Officers (BLOs) found several foreign nationals who had managed to procure multiple identity documents, including Aadhaar, domicile certificates, and ration cards.

Field inquiries were carried out after these findings, and formal notices were then issued. Each person who received a notice has been asked to appear before authorities within seven days to clarify or correct their records.

Applications for inclusion and deletion

The ECI confirmed that, as of Thursday, it has received 1,95,802 applications from voters seeking either inclusion or deletion of names from the draft rolls. Out of these, 24,991 applications have already been processed by EROs. However, the poll body has not yet clarified how many of these applications are for fresh inclusions and how many are for deletions.

Political parties file objections

The Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) has filed 79 petitions, while the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has filed three objections. No other recognised political party, including the BJP and Congress, has filed objections so far. The claims and objections period still has three days left.

The draft voter list for Bihar was published on August 1, with the SIR exercise having started on June 24. According to the poll body, documents of 99.11% of Bihar’s 7.24 crore electors have already been verified. Between June 24 and August 24, nearly 98.2% of voters submitted their documents.

The Supreme Court has directed the ECI to accept Aadhaar or any of the 11 other officially listed documents from citizens seeking inclusion in the voter list. In response, the commission has urged the court to trust its ongoing verification process.

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