Examine the changes in documentary requirements for new voters under SIR and their impact on the right to vote.

Form 6 is the application for fresh enrolment on the electoral roll. Under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) ordered in Bihar with 1 July 2025 as the qualifying date — the first intensive revision since 2003 [2] — Form 6 for the first time carried a declaration on the applicant's birth period and supporting documents [1], shifting the onus of proof onto the new voter.

How the requirements changed

• Tiered regime (Bihar): born before 1.7.1987 — own document; 1.7.1987–2.12.2004 — own plus one parent's; after 2.12.2004 — own plus both parents' documents [1].
• Where a parent was not an Indian citizen, that parent's passport and visa valid on the applicant's date of birth was required [1].
• Relaxation: the ECI uploaded the 2003 rolls, exempting 4.96 crore electors and their children from documents [3].
• Phase II (9 States, 3 UTs) [4] shifted the test — applicants declare whether they or their parents appear in the last SIR, citing constituency, booth and serial number [1].

Impact on the right to vote

• Every 18-year-old today was born after 2004, so all first-time voters fall in the heaviest tier [1]; orphaned, single-parent and migrant households suffer most.
• Bihar's enumeration flagged nearly 65 lakh entries — 1.59% dead, 2.2% permanently shifted, 0.73% duplicate [5]; a child of an untraceable parent has no serial number to quote.
• The 1.7.1987 and 2.12.2004 cut-offs derive from the Citizenship Act, 1955, drawing citizenship determination into roll revision, testing Article 326.

The counterview

• Purity of a 22-year-old roll is a legitimate aim [2], and ADR v. ECI (2026) upheld SIR as within the ECI's mandate under the RP Act, 1950 [6]. Yet safeguards — hearing, reasoned order, appeal to DM and CEO [6] — protect against deletion, not rejection of a fresh application.

Purity and inclusion are complementary, not competing. Publishing each State's base roll before demanding serial numbers [3], extending reasoned orders and appeals to rejected Form 6 applications, and freezing a uniform declaration format would make SIR both clean and inclusive, honouring universal adult franchise.