Bhubaneswar: The opposition BJD has accused the state election machinery of manipulation and lack of transparency in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process.
The party also claimed that actually 27.5 lakh names were deleted from the electoral roll, much higher than the official figure of 20.66 lakh.
At a press conference at the BJD headquarter on Tuesday, senior party leaders Bhrugu Baxipatra and Bijay Nayak alleged that the voter figures released at different stages of the revision did not tally and questioned the basis for the deletion of such a large number of names.
The party said the 2025 electoral roll had 3,40,72,744 voters when the SIR was notified on May 14, while only around 3.16 crore voters were mapped at the outset. The draft roll subsequently contained 3,13,87,034 voters.
The Naveen Patnaik-led party also alleged that the process disproportionately affected eligible and minority voters, political pressure was exerted on BLOs, and some voters were wrongly identified as Bangladeshi nationals. It cited Dhamnagar as an instance of alleged irregularities.
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BJD further questioned the lack of timely action over a purported statement by Titlagarh MLA Naveen Jain that voters who did not support the BJP would be removed from the electoral roll.
Baxipatra said the party had monitored the exercise at more than 40,000 booths and repeatedly raised objections with the Chief Electoral Officer.
The party demanded corrective measures and restoration of the names of all eligible voters excluded from the final roll.