A Congress leader has moved the Supreme Court seeking directions to the Election Commission to disclose constituency-wise data on additions and deletions during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal and the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for adjudicating on appeals before SIR Appellate Tribunals.
In his petition, West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee’s SIR Committee chairperson Prasenjit Bose urged the top court to direct the poll panel, the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal and the state government to make public the detailed data of the SIR exercise.
The absence of constituency-wise data and non-publication of formats prescribed under the Election Commission’s Electoral Rolls Manual, 2024 raises concerns regarding transparency, accountability and public scrutiny of the revision process, Bose contended.
The SIR in West Bengal was conducted just before the assembly elections in which the BJP recorded a historic decisive victory over the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC.
The petition came barely a few days after the Supreme Court on May 27 upheld the constitutional validity of the SIR of the electoral rolls in various states undertaken by the Election Commission, saying it advanced the constitutional imperative of free and fair elections.
The Bench – which also included Justice Joymalya Bagchi — categorically ruled that the Election Commission had the powers to conduct the SIR under Article 324 of the Constitution read with Representation of the People Act and the Rules framed thereunder.
“An assembly constituency-wise analysis of the West Bengal assembly election results indicates that, out of the 207 seats secured by the BJP in 2026, the extent of alterations carried out under the SIR, including deletions and additions, exceeded the eventual margin of victory in 82 Assembly Constituencies,” he submitted.
Out of these 82 constituencies, 70 were situated in 12 Muslim-concentrated districts. Notably, in 2021, the BJP had secured victory in only 9 of these constituencies, the petitioner said. “The data therefore suggests that the SIR-related alterations may have had a significant bearing on the electoral outcome in these 82 Assembly Constituencies,” he submitted.
While more than 58 lakh electors were excluded during the enumeration phase of the SIR exercise, the Election Commission has not disclosed constituency-wise data regarding applications for inclusion and deletion of names from electoral rolls, the petitioner submitted.
By January 2026, over 9.64 lakh applications seeking inclusion of names in electoral rolls and 99,118 applications seeking deletions had been received. However, only 1.82 lakh additions were reflected in the final electoral rolls published on February 28, 2026, he said.
Bose has sought disclosure of the number of Form 6 and Form 7 applications submitted, admitted and rejected in each constituency during the claims and objections phase of the SIR exercise.
