A public interest litigation (PIL) has been filed in the Supreme Court of India demanding a detailed, constituency-wise disclosure of voter deletions following a controversial Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal. The plea alleges that the large-scale removal of voters—which affected millions of electors—had a direct and significant bearing on the historic outcome of the recent 2026 assembly elections.
Filed by Prasenjit Bose, chairperson of the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee’s SIR Committee, through advocate Neha Rathi, the petition urges the apex court to direct the Election Commission of India (ECI), the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal, and the state government to make all data regarding the revision exercise public.
This legal challenge comes shortly after a Supreme Court bench, led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, upheld the Election Commission’s authority to conduct the Special Intensive Revision and its underlying modalities, while reiterating that Aadhaar is not proof of citizenship.
The Electoral Impact: 82 Critical Battlegrounds
At the heart of the petition is the claim that the intensive revision of voter lists altered the political landscape just before the high-stakes assembly polls. The elections concluded with a historic victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which won 207 seats in the 294-member House, securing a two-thirds majority and ending the Trinamool Congress’s (TMC) 15-year rule.
However, the petitioner presents a detailed analysis suggesting the outcome could have been different. According to the plea, the scale of voter alterations—including both additions and deletions—exceeded the final margin of victory in 82 assembly constituencies won by the BJP.
Even more striking, the petition points out that:
- Out of these 82 crucial constituencies, 70 were located within 12 Muslim-concentrated districts.
- In the previous 2021 elections, the BJP had secured victories in only 9 of these same 70 constituencies.
“The data therefore suggests that the SIR-related alterations may have had a significant bearing on the electoral outcome in these 82 Assembly Constituencies,” the petition states, pointing to a potential shift in representation driven by voter list adjustments.
Millions of Voters Erased: The Scale of Deletions
The discrepancies in the sheer volume of deleted voters form another core pillar of the legal challenge. The petition highlights a massive drop in West Bengal’s overall voter base:
- The Initial Drop: Official data published on February 28, 2026, revealed that 63.66 lakh names—representing approximately 8.3% of the state’s total electorate—were deleted after the SIR process commenced in November last year. This reduced the state’s voter base from 7.66 crore to just over 7.04 crore.
- The April Update: Subsequent ECI data released on April 7, 2026, indicated an even larger purge, showing that nearly 91 lakh voters had been deleted across the state.
- Exclusions and Discrepancies: The petition claims more than 58 lakh electors were excluded during the initial enumeration phase. Furthermore, during the subsequent claims and objections phase, while 9.64 lakh inclusion applications and 99,118 deletion requests were submitted, only 1.82 lakh additions actually made it to the final electoral roll published on February 28.
The petitioner argues that the criteria used to flag more than 60 lakh cases for “logical discrepancies”—such as parent-child age gaps, name mismatches, and multiple progeny linkages—are not recognized under the Representation of the People Act, leading to widespread deletions without proper oversight.
Red Tape and Margins: The Appellate Struggle
While the Supreme Court previously directed the establishment of 19 appellate tribunals to address voter grievances, the PIL alleges these mechanisms have failed to provide timely relief, particularly to poor and marginalized communities.
The Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) formulated by a three-member judicial committee on April 7 was never made public. The plea contends that the lack of accessible guidelines on how to file appeals, when hearings would occur, or how notices would be served left voters in state of procedural confusion.
These bottlenecks are reflected in the disposal rates:
- Out of nearly 25 lakh appeals filed before the tribunals by anxious voters, only a tiny fraction had been resolved by mid-May.
- Data cited in the petition shows that as of May 14, only 6,581 appeals had been decided.
- Notably, of those resolved, 4,043 appeals were allowed, meaning the vast majority of reviewed cases resulted in the restoration of the voter’s status—highlighting potential errors in the initial deletion process.
What the Petition Demands
To restore confidence in the electoral process, the petitioner has sought immediate intervention and specific directions from the Supreme Court, including:
- Granular Transparency: Directing authorities to publish assembly constituency-wise figures for Form 6 (inclusion) and Form 7 (deletion/objection) applications, including those accepted, rejected, or pending before tribunals.
- Access to Justice: Publicly releasing the appellate tribunals’ SOP and translating simplified appeal instructions into Bangla, Hindi, and English.
- Restoration Rights: Allowing any voter deleted during any phase of the SIR process the automatic right to approach the appellate tribunals to seek the restoration of their voting rights.
“The absence of such disclosure raises serious concerns regarding transparency, accountability and public scrutiny of the electoral roll revision process,” the plea concludes.
