At CEC’s ‘public impeachment’, voters question deletion of names from rolls

The Indian National Developmental, Inclusive Alliance’s symbolic “public impeachment” of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar on Saturday (October 31, 2026) featured accounts from voters who alleged that their names had been deleted from electoral rolls during the special intensive revision (SIR) exercise.

Among them was Anita Jaiswal, who moved from Kolkata to Delhi. She said she had voted in every election between 2012 and 2025 but was now being asked to establish her citizenship.

“I am a single mother. They told me to get an Aadhaar card, saying it would prove that I am a citizen. Who gave you the right to remove my voter ID? My daughter gets a scholarship, has a bank account and an Aadhaar card, and now you are deleting our names. Who gave you the right?” she asked, adding, “Prove which country I am from.”

Iftikar Ahmed, another voter from Kolkata, said he had voted in the same Chowrangee constituency for 20 years but received a notice during the SIR hearing seeking documents because of a mapping discrepancy. His father, too, had been voting from the same address for two decades, he said. “Our names have been removed in a planned manner,” he alleged.

Declared dead

Nikhil Dey, founder of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, who has been working with affected voters, introduced Kanta Prasad, who had been declared dead in the exercise. “He spoke very convincingly for a corpse! The deprivation of the right to vote is a crime against the Constitution and a blot on our democracy. There must be accountability,” Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said in a post on X.

RTI activist Anjali Bharadwaj said that in response to an application seeking copies of files recording the decision-making process behind the SIR, the Election Commission of India (ECI) had replied that no such file existed.

“T.C. Kom, who is a Principal Secretary, said the ECI had not taken any decision to conduct an SIR,” Ms. Bharadwaj claimed.

‘Favoured one party’

Swaraj Abhiyan chief Yogendra Yadav described Mr. Kumar as the “Mukhya Chunav Abhiyukt (Chief Election Culprit)” rather than the “Mukhya Chunav Ayukt (Chief Election Commissioner)”.

All India Students’ Association (AISA) national president Neha Bora alleged that the SIR was a deliberate attempt to disenfranchise young voters and undermine democracy. Questioning the functioning of electoral registration officers (EROs), she said their statutory authority was being overridden through the use of software to exclude eligible voters. “You have abused your public office and favoured one political party,” she alleged.

The programme was held in the garden of Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s residence in New Delhi. Former Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar presided over the proceedings, while Mr. Kharge moved the motion.