The ECI’s unfinished lessons

1. At a Glance

• Topic: An op-ed on whether the Election Commission of India (ECI) can make sure every eligible voter stays on the roll, given the mass revision of electoral rolls, suspicious voter deletions and disputes over access to polling records [1].
• Main argument: The ECI does not have to accept every allegation from political parties, but its constitutional authority is no substitute for verifiable evidence [1].
• Historical lesson: When India prepared its first electoral roll, nearly 28 lakh women were left off because they were listed by their relationship to men rather than by their own names. CEC Sukumar Sen corrected this [1].
• Why UPSC cares: The topic covers Article 324 (superintendence of elections), Article 326 (adult suffrage), the RP Act, 1950, the Supreme Court's 2026 ruling on the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), and electoral integrity versus inclusion. It is core GS-II material [2][3].

2. Why in the News

• The Hindu op-ed (Page 9, 21 Oct 2026): "The ECI's unfinished lessons" by Anurodh Lalit Jain, Vice-Chairman of the AICC Minority Department. The author states the views are personal, so read it as a partisan view [1].
• Bihar SIR (2025): Around 65 lakh names were missing from the draft roll published in August 2025. The ECI cited deaths, migration and duplicate entries [1].
• Supreme Court ruling, 27 May 2026: The Court upheld the ECI's power to conduct SIR under Article 324 read with Section 21(3) of the RP Act, 1950 [3][4].
• Form 6 dispute (Oct 2026): In a later SIR, a modified Form 6 declaration raised a new question. Can the ECI change enrolment conditions under Article 324 without amending the Registration of Electors Rules? This is now before the Supreme Court [8].
• SIR in other states: The ECI is running SIR in phases, with multiple safeguards for eligible voters. The op-ed cites West Bengal as another contested case [7][1].

3. Background & Evolution

• First electoral roll (before 1951-52): About 28 lakh women were left off because they were identified as someone's wife, daughter or mother rather than by name [1].
• Correction under Sukumar Sen: India's first CEC made sure women were enrolled in their own right. By the 1957 elections, about 85% of the affected women had been registered under their own names [1].
• 2003: Last intensive revision of Bihar's rolls before 2025 [2].
• 24 June 2025: The ECI ordered the Bihar SIR under Article 324 and Section 21 of the RP Act, 1950. The qualifying date was 1 July 2025 [2].
• August 2025: The draft roll was published with about 65 lakh names missing. The Supreme Court directed the ECI to publish the list of excluded voters with reasons [1].
• August 2025: The Supreme Court directed that Aadhaar be accepted for re-inclusion alongside the 11 listed documents. It also held that Aadhaar does not prove citizenship on its own [5][6].
• 27 May 2026: The Supreme Court upheld the SIR in judgment 2026 INSC 564 [3][4].
• 2026: Further phased SIR and the Form 6 litigation [7][8].

4. Core Static Facts

Item	Fact
Constitutional basis of ECI	Art. 324: superintendence, direction and control of elections [2]
Eligibility to vote	Art. 326: Indian citizen, 18+ on the qualifying date, not disqualified by law [2]
Statutory power for special revision	Sec. 21(3), RP Act, 1950 [2][3]
Appeals on enrolment	Sec. 24, RP Act, 1950: first to the District Magistrate, then to the Chief Electoral Officer [2]
Claims and objections	Decided by the ERO/AERO [2]
Field verification	House-to-house checks by Booth Level Officers (BLOs) [2]
Bihar SIR qualifying date	1 July 2025 [2]
Documents for re-inclusion	11 listed documents, or Aadhaar [5]
Aadhaar's status	Proof of identity, not citizenship [6]
Enrolment form	Form 6: application for inclusion of a new elector [8]
ECI's stated reasons for SIR	Rapid urbanisation, migration, newly eligible young voters, unreported deaths, names of illegal foreign immigrants [2]
Bihar electorate (reported)	7.89 crore → 7.42 crore [9]
First CEC	Sukumar Sen [1]

5. Multi-Dimensional Analysis

Legal / Constitutional

• The Supreme Court held that SIR does not replace the RP Act and the Rules. It carries out the Art. 324 mandate within the limits of Sec. 21(3) [3].
• Art. 324 is a plenary power, but it fills gaps rather than overriding the statute. The Form 6 case tests exactly this limit [8].
• Art. 326 makes citizenship a condition for voting. That raises the question of who must prove citizenship, the voter or the State [2][6].

Social

• The 28 lakh women left off the first roll show that rules which look neutral can exclude whole groups [1].
• Migrants, women who changed address after marriage, poor people with few documents and minorities are most at risk of being deleted from rolls [1][2].
• A universal-franchise right is only real if exclusions can be checked and challenged [1].

Ethical / Governance

• Transparency: Voters must be able to see why their names were removed. The Supreme Court ordered the excluded list to be published with reasons [1].
• Trust deficit: The op-ed argues the ECI must answer allegations with evidence, not by pointing to its authority [1].
• Access to polling records is a further transparency demand from the op-ed [1].

Administrative

• The work depends on BLOs' capacity, short timelines, and getting enumeration forms back from voters [2].
• The appeal chain runs ERO/AERO → District Magistrate → Chief Electoral Officer under Sec. 24 [2].
• Doing SIR in phases is meant to avoid mass, unchecked deletions [7].

Historical

• Sukumar Sen's fix suggests a working principle: the ECI should actively enrol eligible voters, not just clean up rolls [1].

6. Recent Developments (last 12-18 months)

• 24 Jun 2025: Bihar SIR announced; qualifying date 1 Jul 2025 [2].
• Aug 2025: Draft roll published; about 65 lakh names missing [1].
• Aug 2025: Supreme Court ruled that Aadhaar is not proof of citizenship by itself [6].
• Aug 2025: Supreme Court ordered that Aadhaar be accepted alongside the 11 documents for re-inclusion [5].
• Bihar outcome: Reports put initial deletions at about 65 lakh, falling to about 47 lakh after claims and corrections. Figures differ across reports [9].
• 27 May 2026: Supreme Court upheld the SIR (2026 INSC 564), saying roll revision is necessary for free and fair polls [3][4].
• 2026: The ECI expanded SIR in phases with safeguards [7].
• Oct 2026: Supreme Court began examining whether the ECI can change the Form 6 declaration without amending the Rules [8].

7. Prelims Hooks

• The ECI derives its power of superintendence, direction and control of elections from Article 324 [2].
• The right to vote rests on adult suffrage under Article 326: citizen, 18+ on the qualifying date [2].
• Special revision of electoral rolls is done under Section 21(3) of the RP Act, 1950, not the RP Act, 1951 [2][3].
• Appeals on enrolment go first to the District Magistrate, then to the CEO, under Section 24 of the RP Act, 1950 [2].
• The Bihar SIR used 1 July 2025 as its qualifying date [2].
• The previous intensive revision in Bihar was in 2003 [2].
• The Supreme Court upheld the ECI's SIR power on 27 May 2026 [3].
• Aadhaar proves identity but not citizenship [6].
• Re-inclusion was allowed with any one of the 11 documents, or Aadhaar [5].
• Sukumar Sen was India's first Chief Election Commissioner [1].
• About 28 lakh women were left off India's first electoral roll [1].
• By 1957, about 85% of those women had been enrolled in their own names [1].
• Form 6 is the application to include a new elector [8].
• House-to-house verification is done by Booth Level Officers [2].

8. What the Supreme Court Settled on Citizenship, and What It Left Open

• The 2026 judgment allowed SIR but put limits on the ECI's citizenship checks
• The ECI may look at citizenship only to decide one thing: whether a person can be on the electoral roll [11].

• The ECI cannot make a final decision that someone is not a citizen. Only the Central Government's authorities under the Citizenship Act can do that [11].

• Being on the roll counts in the voter's favour

• A name on the roll carries a presumption of citizenship. This means the law starts by assuming that a listed voter is a citizen [11].
• The presumption can be overturned only after a proper and appropriate inquiry [11].

• Removing a name from the roll is not a legal declaration that the person is a foreigner [11].

• The Court built in a path back onto the roll

• Every deletion on citizenship grounds must be sent to the competent authority within four weeks [11].
• If that authority confirms the person is a citizen, the name must go back on the roll at once [11].

• The whole process stays open to judicial review (a court can check whether the procedure was fair and lawful) [11].

• Why this matters for the op-ed's argument

• The Court said the ECI has a degree of residual authority to decide which documents to ask for, but that this authority is not unbounded [11].
• Any change from the legal form must have a rational nexus (a clear, logical link) with the purpose of SIR [11].

• So the question is no longer whether the ECI can revise rolls. It is whether each step the ECI takes can be justified. That is the evidence test the op-ed asks for [1].

• One question is still open: who has to prove citizenship

• Before the Court, the ECI argued that the papers proving citizenship are within the special knowledge of the person, so the person must produce them [3].
• Petitioners argued that this reverses the presumption and gives BLOs too much unchecked power [3].
• If the voter has to prove citizenship, poor people with few documents carry the heaviest load. The note already lists them as the groups most at risk [2].

9. Why Migrants, Not the Dead, Make Up Most Deletions

• Migration, not death, is the main reason names are removed
• A study of SIR across states found that migration caused about 70% of deletions. Northern states were hit hardest [10].

• In Bihar, too, migration overtook death as the biggest reason for proposed deletions [10].

• Why a migrant can end up on no roll at all

• A BLO marks a worker as "shifted" in the home village, and the name is removed there.
• The worker is not added at the city address unless they file a fresh application themselves.

• Seasonal workers often keep their main tie with home, so they may never apply in the city. The result is a citizen who can vote nowhere.

• The claims process fixed only part of the problem

• Across states, draft rolls marked 97 million electors for removal, or 13.7% of the electorate [10].
• After verification, final rolls removed 86 million, or 12.1% [10].
• So most people flagged in the draft stayed off the final roll.

• In West Bengal, Goa and Bihar, the share removed went up between the draft and the final roll, not down [10].

• Women are again losing out more than men

• In 11 states, women made up a larger share of exclusions than men [10].
• Women who move after marriage are likely to be marked "shifted" in the same way as migrant workers.
• This is the same pattern as the 28 lakh women missed on the first roll: a rule that looks neutral, applied to lives that do not fit it [1].

10. The Strongest Case for the ECI, and Where It Falls Short

• The ECI's case is strong, and part of it is right
• The CEC has said the names of dead voters, migrants and duplicate entries cannot stay on the rolls [16].
• Bihar's last intensive revision was in 2003. More than twenty years of deaths and migration had piled up on the rolls [2].
• The Supreme Court agreed that revising rolls is necessary for free and fair polls [4].

• A padded roll is not harmless. A duplicate or dead voter's entry can be misused, and that weakens the value of every real vote.

• The op-ed also comes from one side

• The author holds an office in the AICC, so the piece is a party view [1].

• The Court itself called the Bihar dispute largely a trust deficit issue (a problem of trust, not just of law) [12]. That points to failures of communication as well as failures of process.

• Where the ECI's case falls short

• Cleaning up the roll shows up quickly in the numbers. Wrongly removing a real voter is slow and hard to spot. The person usually finds out only on polling day.
• The claims process puts the effort on the voter. Only people who know they were removed, and have the papers, get back on the roll. The small fall from 13.7% to 12.1% suggests many did not [10].

• Sukumar Sen did more than delete wrong entries. He went out and enrolled the women who had been missed, and about 85% of them were on the roll by 1957 [1]. Today's SIR has no matching drive to add people.

• A fair conclusion

• The ECI is right that rolls must be cleaned. The op-ed is right that cleaning without published evidence cannot earn trust.
• The real test is whether the ECI works as hard to add eligible voters as it does to remove ineligible ones.

11. The Form 6 Episode: When the ECI Claimed More Than the Court Said

• The ECI claimed court approval that the Court says it never gave
• The ECI said the SIR declaration attached to Form 6 had been upheld by the Supreme Court [13].
• The Court then said it had not approved any change to Form 6 [13].

• Reports say the 2026 judgment looked at an earlier declaration used in Bihar (Annexure D), not the later Form 6 version now in dispute [8].

• The ECI then stepped back

• The ECI withdrew the SIR declaration from Form 6 [14].

• The Court is still examining a bigger question: can the ECI change who may enrol, using Article 324 alone, without amending the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960 [8]?

• Why this matters

• Article 324 is a plenary power. That means it is broad, but it fills gaps in the law. It does not override the law [3].
• When a constitutional body claims approval it does not have, it uses its authority as if it were evidence. That is exactly what the op-ed warns against [1].
• Each episode like this makes the trust deficit the Court noticed worse [12].

12. What the ECI, the Courts and Parliament Should Do Next

• ECI: publish deletion data broken down by reason and gender, booth by booth
• The Supreme Court already made the ECI publish the list of excluded voters with reasons in Bihar [1].

• Women are over-represented among exclusions in 11 states [10]. Booth-wise data on gender and reason would let anyone check where wrong deletions are piling up.

• ECI: run a Sukumar Sen-style drive to enrol people, not just remove them

• Sen corrected the 28 lakh missing women by actively enrolling them [1].

• Since migration causes about 70% of deletions [10], the drive should enrol people at their new address when they are removed from the old one, so they are not left off both rolls.

• ECI: follow the four-week referral rule and report progress publicly

• The judgment requires every citizenship-based deletion to be sent to the competent authority within four weeks, with the name restored if citizenship is confirmed [11].

• Publishing how many cases were sent, decided and restored would show whether this safeguard works in practice.

• Courts: keep watching the appeals

• In August 2026, the Supreme Court asked for the status of appeals against SIR deletions in West Bengal [15].

• Appeals under Section 24 go to the District Magistrate and then the CEO [2]. If the appeal chain stalls before an election, the removal works as a final verdict even when it is wrong.

• Parliament and the Law Ministry: change enrolment rules by amending them, not by editing forms

• The Form 6 dispute shows the risk of the ECI changing enrolment conditions with only Article 324 behind it [8].
• Any new declaration should go through an amendment to the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, so it can be debated and challenged openly.

13. Anchors for Answers

• Data: About 65 lakh names were missing from Bihar's draft roll; about 47 lakh net deletions remained after claims, and the electorate fell from 7.89 to 7.42 crore [1][9]
• Data: Across states, 97 million (13.7%) were flagged in draft rolls and 86 million (12.1%) were deleted in final rolls; migration caused about 70% of deletions [10]
• Data: Women made up a larger share of exclusions than men in 11 states [10]
• Law/Case: 2026 INSC 564 (27 May 2026): SIR upheld; ECI's citizenship check is limited to roll eligibility; a roll entry carries a presumption of citizenship; citizenship-based deletions must be referred within four weeks [3][11]
• Law/Case: Art. 324 read with Sec. 21(3), RP Act, 1950; Art. 326; Registration of Electors Rules, 1960 (Form 6 dispute) [2][8]
• Comparison: India's first roll (1951–57): Sukumar Sen actively enrolled the 28 lakh women who had been missed, reaching about 85% by 1957. That was an enrolment drive, not a deletion drive [1]

14. Mains Relevance

• GS-II: Salient features of the RP Act; appointment to and functions of constitutional bodies; Indian Constitution (Arts. 324, 326).
• GS-II: Transparency and accountability in governance.
• GS-IV (secondary): Institutional integrity and public trust.
• Possible questions: 1. "The power of the Election Commission under Article 324 is plenary but not unbounded." Discuss with reference to the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. (250 words) 2. Balancing the integrity of electoral rolls with inclusion is the ECI's central challenge today. Examine, drawing lessons from the preparation of India's first electoral roll. (250 words) 3. Critically examine the role of transparency and procedural safeguards in maintaining public trust in electoral management bodies. (150 words)

15. Related Topics to Study Next

• RP Act, 1950 vs RP Act, 1951: The 1950 Act covers rolls and delimitation; the 1951 Act covers the conduct of elections and disputes. They are often confused.
• Registration of Electors Rules, 1960: The rules at issue in the Form 6 / Art. 324 limits case [8].
• Appointment of CEC and ECs: The independence of the ECI underlies the trust debate.
• Aadhaar–voter ID linkage: Linked to the Supreme Court's Aadhaar-not-citizenship ruling [6].
• Citizenship Act, 1955 / NRC: The Art. 326 citizenship condition and who bears the burden of proof.
• Delimitation: A related exercise of electoral boundary-setting that is currently in the news.
• Model Code of Conduct and the ECI's Art. 324 powers: Another area where Art. 324 fills gaps in the law.
• Remote voting for migrants: Migration is a main cause of deletions [2].

16. NCERT Concepts to Revise

• Special Intensive Revision (Polity): The article's core subject: the ECI's house-to-house roll revision in Bihar, its Supreme Court challenge and the exclusion row.
• Election Commission of India (Polity): Its Article 324 powers, and the limits on them, are the central legal question of the op-ed.
• Electoral roll (Polity): The roll, who is added or deleted, and how the 28 lakh women were missed are the debate's heart.
• Universal adult franchise (Polity): Article 326 adult suffrage explains why leaving eligible voters off the roll, as with early women voters, matters.
• Transparency (Polity): The op-ed asks the ECI to back its actions with verifiable evidence, such as published reasons for deletions.
• Aadhaar (Polity): The Supreme Court allowed it for re-inclusion but held it does not prove citizenship.

17. Common Errors / Trap Areas

• Wrong Act: Electoral rolls fall under the RP Act, 1950, not 1951. Section 21(3) is the special revision power. One media report cites Section 16 instead, but ECI's own release says Section 21 [2].
• Wrong appeal authority: Under Sec. 24, the first appeal goes to the District Magistrate, then to the CEO. It does not go to the ECI or a court [2].
• Aadhaar's status: The Supreme Court allowed Aadhaar for re-inclusion as an identity document, but held it is not proof of citizenship [5][6].
• Confused figures: About 65 lakh names were missing from the draft roll [1]. Net deletions were reported at about 47 lakh, with the electorate falling from 7.89 to 7.42 crore [9]. Keep draft-stage and final figures separate.
• What the 2026 judgment did not decide: It upheld SIR, but did not rule on the modified Form 6 declaration, which is still pending [8].