Chennai: The final electoral rolls in Tamil Nadu were released on Monday by the state’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Archana Patnaik.
Following the Election Commission of India’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, over 74 lakh names have been deleted from the voter list.
The total electorate strength, which was 6.41 crore as on October 27, 2025 before the SIR exercise, has gone down to 5.67 crore as on February 23, 2026. That is a reduction of around 11.5 per cent.
According to the CEO Tamil Nadu, the revised electorate consists of 2.7 crore men, 2.8 crore women, and 7,617 third gender voters.
Tamil Nadu will be going to polls this summer, along with Kerala, West Bengal, Puducherry and Assam.
Among other states where SIR exercise has been completed and final list released, Gujarat has seen the highest net deletions, with 68,12,711 electors removed – which amounts to 13.5%.
Madhya Pradesh had 34,25,078 deletions (5.97% reduction), Rajasthan saw the number of electors reduced by 31.36 lakh, Chhattisgarh recorded a decline of 24,99,823 voters, Kerala less than 10 lakh (8,97,211), and Goa’s list was cut by 1,27,468 voters.
Among Union Territories, Andaman and Nicobar Islands saw the elector list decrease by 52,364, Puducherry by 77,367, and Lakshadweep by just 206.
The first phase of the controversial SIR exercise was carried out in Bihar last year, ahead of Assembly polls there. The second phase, which started in November, covered 12 states and UTs, and the final phase will get underway in April in 23 states and UTs.
