91% Restored: Questions Mount Over Bengal’s SIR

West Bengal’s controversial Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls has come under renewed scrutiny after Election Commission data showed that 75,443, or 91.13%, of the 82,782 appeals disposed of by appellate tribunals so far resulted in voters being added back to the electoral rolls. The figures, revealed through an RTI response obtained by Congress MP Isha Khan Choudhury, have raised fresh questions over the deletion of 27,28,500 voters classified as “Not Eligible” during the SIR adjudication process.

The numbers, however, need to be read carefully. The 91% restoration rate applies only to the appeals that have actually been decided, not to all 27 lakh voters whose names were removed during adjudication. As of August 7, the tribunals had received 38,10,620 appeals but disposed of only 82,782, around 2.17% of the total leaving 37,27,838 appeals pending. Of the cases decided, 75,443 resulted in inclusion and 7,339 in exclusion.

The scale of the appeals has itself become a point of contention. The EC data shows 38,10,620 appeals against 27,28,500 people recorded as “Not Eligible”, a difference of 10,82,120. Congress MP Isha Khan Choudhury has sought an explanation from the poll panel for the gap, while Congress leader Prasenjit Bose has claimed that only around seven lakh of the 27 lakh voters removed over “logical discrepancies” themselves approached the tribunals. According to him, a large share of the remaining appeals were filed by the Election Commission or individual objectors seeking exclusion of names.

The issue has now reached the Supreme Court, which on August 25 asked the Election Commission to provide a detailed district-wise and category-wise breakup of the appeals. The court specifically sought figures distinguishing voters who are challenging their own exclusion from those challenging the inclusion of other names. The bench observed that these categories carry different levels of urgency because exclusion directly affects a person’s right to vote.

The Supreme Court’s intervention comes as the tribunal process itself faces questions over its pace. With more than 37 lakh appeals still pending based on the August 7 data, the court has asked the EC to explain how it plans to streamline and expedite the process. It also indicated that the entire exercise should be completed well before the next Lok Sabha election in 2029.

The district-wise figures add another layer to the debate. Murshidabad recorded the highest number of appeals at 7,47,305, but only 434 names had been restored and 53 excluded among the cases disposed of so far. In Malda, 5,31,149 appeals were filed, with all 1,471 disposed cases resulting in inclusion. North 24 Parganas recorded 3,58,872 appeals, of which all 277 disposed cases resulted in inclusion. South 24 Parganas saw 20,107 names restored and 24 excluded out of the cases decided so far, the highest number of restorations among the districts.

The controversy centres on the SIR exercise carried out ahead of the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections, through which the electoral rolls underwent a large-scale revision. Among the categories examined during adjudication were voters flagged for “logical discrepancies”  including certain mismatches in family details, age relationships and previous electoral-roll mapping. Those whose claims were rejected could approach the appellate tribunals for reconsideration.

The latest numbers do not, by themselves, prove that the original deletions were erroneous. The 91% figure comes from a relatively small fraction of the appeals that have been decided, and the overwhelming majority of appeals are still pending. But the fact that more than nine out of every ten disposed cases have so far ended in inclusion has made the tribunal process a significant new point of scrutiny in the SIR debate.

For the Election Commission, the immediate challenge is therefore twofold: explaining the striking gap between the number of voters categorised as “Not Eligible” and the much larger number of appeals, while also dealing with a tribunal backlog running into lakhs. With the Supreme Court now seeking a fuller account of who filed these appeals, what they sought and how quickly they are being resolved, the question surrounding Bengal’s voter rolls has moved beyond how many names were deleted  to what happened when those deletions were challenged.