3 min readBengaluruUpdated: Jun 30, 2026 02:07 AM IST
With the ruling Congress seeking clarification on logical discrepancy and Home Minister Priyank Kharge citing Tamil Nadu, Kerala and West Bengal where the exercise, he said, has “robbed the poor of their rights”, Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls will begin in Karnataka on Tuesday over a period of almost a month until July 29 and culminate in the publication of final electoral rolls on October 7.
A total of 59,050 booth level-officers (BLOs) will distribute enumeration forms to residents and undertake house-to-house visits until July 29. The Election Commission has mapped 91.61% or 5.07 crore of 5.54 crore voters in Karnataka after comparing legacy and current electoral rolls. While 46.53 lakh voters are still unmapped, the mapping exercise is ongoing, Chief Electoral Officer V Anbu Kumar said Monday.
“In the current phase of the SIR, the EC will not seek any documents from the people. They will just have to fill the enumeration forms and submit them,” he said. If family members are not present for any reason, an adult member of the family can sign the SIR enumeration form on their behalf, he said.
After the draft rolls are out on August 5, objections can be filed until September 9. Once the Election Commission issues notice to a specific individual, claims and objections will have to be disposed of by October 3. The poll panel will then publish the final electoral roll for Karnataka on October 7.
Ahead of the launch of roll revision, the Congress had highlighted several issues with Home Minister Priyank Kharge saying on Monday that despite petitions to the EC and CEO seeking certain clarifications, the poll panel has failed to respond. “We sought clarity on logical discrepancy, on the criteria to exempt people from the voter list etc. But, there is no response,” he said.
“Voter roll revision is compulsory and it is the right of the Election Commission,” Kharge said, “A similar exercise in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and West Bengal was held in such a manner that it robbed the poor of their rights.” Earlier, Karnataka Industries Minister M B Patil alleged that the BJP was trying to remove “Congress voters” using SIR by targeting 97 Assembly segments in the state.
During the day, MLC Ramesh Babu wrote to the CEO, flagging the need for “rectification of conflicting BLO/BLO Supervisor details published in CEO Karnataka website and postponement of the SIR process until accurate information is made available”. If the EC failed to rectify the discrepancies immediately, “postpone the ongoing SIR process until correct and verified information is published…,” he said in a letter.
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After SIR was announced, the Congress formed SIR Monitoring Committees in the last week of May at the state, division and district levels, and directed party workers to keep an eye on the exercise at the booth-levels. Over the past few weeks, it has held awareness rallies on special roll revision across Karnataka. A similar strategy has also been adopted by the BJP which held multiple workshops for its party workers.
