Pan-India SIR to cover more than 10 States in first phase

The Election Commission of India (ECI) is all set to announce the schedule for a country-wide roll-out of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the next few days. The first phase of the process will be implemented in more than 10 States and one Union Territory, including election-bound Assam, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, and West Bengal.

The ECI took stock of the preparedness of all States and Union Territories for the pan-India SIR, at the two-day conference of Chief Electoral Officers (CEO) that concluded here on Thursday (October 23, 2025).

The full commission will now discuss the matter and take a call on the schedule, which would be announced soon, sources told The Hindu.

The process is expected to be rolled out in two phases, beginning with Assam, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, and West Bengal, where Assembly elections are due in 2026. Those States where local body polls are scheduled to be held and are likely to experience harsh weather conditions during winters will be tackled in later phases.

The sources said the commission heard the points raised by the CEOs of all States at the conference and while it responded to general queries and held a presentation on the SIR, no concrete decisions were announced at the meeting. It was stated that a decision would be communicated to all CEOs after the meeting of the Election Commission members.

The two-day conference was presided over by Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, along with Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi.

The commission assessed the progress made on the directions previously issued to the CEOs to map the current electors with the electors as per the last SIR in the States and Union Territories, according to an official statement by the poll body.

The statement said the commission also interacted one-to-one with the CEOs of poll-bound States/Union Territory of Assam, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, and West Bengal.

The conference was held as a follow-up to the SIR preparedness conference held on September 10, during which all the States/UTs gave detailed presentations on the number of electors, qualifying date of last SIR, and the electoral rolls in their respective States/UTs as per the last completed SIR.

The ECI had announced the nationwide SIR on June 24 along with that for Bihar.

The SIR process has been challenged in the Supreme Court. The court, while not questioning the ECI mandate to conduct the SIR, had asked the poll body to include Aadhaar as the 12th document to prove identity. ECI sources have said that the indicative list of documents required to be submitted by electors are likely to be the same as in the Bihar SIR with Aadhaar being considered as a proof of identity only.