Deleted, and left in limbo: SIR wipes lakhs of voters off the rolls in Bihar and Bengal

PATNA/KOLKATA: Across Bihar and West Bengal, lakhs of voters found themselves deleted from the electoral rolls during the Election Commission's Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise — and left in limbo. Over 47 lakh names were struck off in Bihar and nearly 91 lakh in West Bengal, leaving the affected unable to vote in the 2025 and 2026 Assembly elections. Reporters Shrabana Chatterjee and Senjuti Sengupta, documenting the fallout, met voters caught in the exercise's wake: families living with uncertainty, piles of paperwork, and repeated, exhausting attempts to prove their citizenship and eligibility to officials who had already erased them. The disenfranchisement has now sparked a political firestorm in Tamil Nadu. Left parties intensified their agitations across the state on Thursday, demanding the immediate resignation or parliamentary impeachment of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over what they allege is the deletion of 13 crore voters nationwide. Leading a demonstration near Washermanpet in Chennai, CPI(M) state secretary P. Shanmugam alleged that the SIR process was being weaponised to systematically delete targeted voters. 'The duty of the EC — to grant voting rights to all eligible citizens, ensure everyone votes freely, and conduct elections honestly and fairly — has been abandoned. Instead, the Chief Election Commissioner is snatching away voting rights and acting in favour of the BJP to fraudulently form the government,' he said, calling it 'a massive betrayal against the people of India'. CPI(M) politburo member Vasuki, protesting at Nungambakkam, outlined four demands: the CEC's removal, halting the SIR, restoring deleted names, and reconstituting the EC Selection Committee to restore the Chief Justice of India's role in it. 'An Election Commission with the authority to protect rights has morphed into a commission that strips people of their voting rights, betraying the fundamental democratic structure,' she said. CPI state secretary Veerapandian termed the CEC's actions a 'murder of democracy', while CPI(ML) district secretary N. James alleged the CEC acted unilaterally, ignoring internal objections and violating Supreme Court guidelines. The Left is now approaching non-INDIA bloc parties such as the Aam Aadmi Party to build a broader resistance. The anger comes days after a lawyers' group announced an independent panel of retired judges to enquire into the SIR's aftermath — a sign that faith in the Commission's own machinery is collapsing among those it was meant to serve.