New Delhi: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced that the third phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls will be launched across 16 states and three Union Territories, following earlier rounds in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.
The exercise is aimed at preventing electoral malpractices by identifying and deleting names of deceased voters, those who have permanently migrated, and individuals registered as voters in more than one place.
In the third phase, SIR will be carried out in Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, New Delhi, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura, Telangana and Uttarakhand.
The ECI said over 3.94 lakh booth-level officers, supported by 3.42 lakh booth-level agents of political parties, will conduct door-to-door visits covering about 36.73 crore voters. The field work is scheduled from May 30 to October 14, while draft electoral rolls will be published between July 5 and October 21.
The Commission noted that in the first two phases conducted across 13 states and Union Territories, 5.18 crore voters were removed from the rolls.
