NEW DELHI, Feb 19: The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday asked the poll authorities in 22 states and union territories to prepare for holding the “Special Intensive Revision” (SIR) of voter lists possibly from April.
The 22 remaining States and UTs where the SIR process is yet to start are Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Ladakh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, the National Capital Territory of Delhi, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana, and Uttarakhand.
In a letter to the Chief Electoral Officers of these 22 States and UTs, the ECI asked them to complete all preparatory work related to the SIR at the earliest, as the exercise “is expected to start from April 2026.” This preparatory work includes mapping the existing voters with the electoral roll of 2002-2004, when the last SIR was conducted, and training booth-level officers (BLOs) to carry out the exercise.
Bihar was the first State to undergo the SIR process last year, just before its Assembly election. Following this, on October 27, 2025, the poll body ordered the second phase of the SIR in 12 States and UTs, which is underway now. These States included Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Puducherry, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Lakshadweep, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan. The SIR process in these States has seen multiple extensions, with Uttar Pradesh getting the most extra time to complete the exercise.
In Assam, a special revision was conducted instead of SIR, due to legal hurdles posed by an incomplete National Register of Citizens process in the State. After announcing last June that the SIR would be conducted in all States and UTs, the ECI had, in a letter dated July 5, 2025, asked all States to initiate the pre-revision exercise for the SIR.
While announcing the schedule for the third phase, the ECI will have to factor in the Census exercise, which is also scheduled to begin in April. The first phase of the Population Census 2027, the house listing operation, is scheduled to begin on April 1, with the deployment of 30 lakh enumerators, most of whom are teachers from government schools. However, the BLOs who carry out the door-to-door enumeration for the SIR are also largely government school teachers.
ECI sources had earlier indicated that the poll body had held meetings with the Registrar General of India as well the Census Commissioner over how to use the common pool of administrative resources in a staggered manner for both the SIR and the Census.
(Manas Dasgupta)
