Bhubaneswar/New Delhi: The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday announced the third phase of its Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls across 16 states and three Union Territories, including Odisha. The nationwide voter verification exercise will however exclude Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
The exercise will cover Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, DNH & DD, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, NCT of Delhi, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana and Uttarakhand, reported Hindustan Times.
According to the ECI, the latest phase has been aligned with ongoing house-listing operations under the national Census in order to optimise administrative resources and field-level manpower. Officials said separate schedules for Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh would be issued later, citing weather-related challenges and the completion of Census Phase-II activities in the high-altitude regions.
The SIR exercise is aimed at updating and cleaning electoral rolls by identifying duplicate, shifted, deceased and allegedly ineligible voters while ensuring eligible citizens remain on the voter list. The Election Commission has been carrying out the revision in phases since last year.
The move comes after earlier phases of the SIR exercise in several states triggered political controversy, especially West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. Opposition parties had alleged that large-scale deletions of voter names affected genuine electors, while the ECI maintained that the process was necessary to improve the accuracy of electoral rolls.
The Election Commission had earlier rolled out Phase-II of the SIR in 12 states and Union Territories in late 2025, where booth-level officers distributed pre-filled enumeration forms to voters for verification.
