Pointing to the Bihar SIR, where many names were removed arbitrarily, the resolution expressed fear of a similar “politics of exclusion” spreading across the country.
Published Sep 29, 2025 | 1:40 PM ⚊ Updated Sep 29, 2025 | 1:40 PM
Voters in a polling booth in Wayanad.
Synopsis: The Kerala Legislative Assembly unanimously passed a resolution urging the withdrawal of the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. The House expressed “serious reservations” over the decision to hold the SIR just ahead of Kerala’s local body elections in 2025 and Assembly elections in 2026.
Raising strong objections to the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) move to conduct a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, the Kerala Legislative Assembly on Monday, 29 September, unanimously passed a resolution urging the withdrawal of the exercise.
The resolution, introduced by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan under Rule 118, accused the ECI of attempting to push through an “ill-timed and ill-intentioned” process that could deprive sections of society of their constitutional right to vote.
Both the ruling CPI(M)-led LDF and the Opposition Congress-led UDF supported the resolution.
The House expressed “serious reservations” over the decision to hold the SIR just ahead of Kerala’s local body elections in 2025 and Assembly elections in 2026.
Using the electoral rolls prepared in 2002 — the last time a thorough revision was conducted — as the base document was described as “unscientific and impractical.”
Chief Minister Vijayan argued that the requirements introduced under the SIR, particularly the demand for parental citizenship documents, amounted to a violation of universal suffrage guaranteed under Article 326 of the Constitution.
According to the guidelines, individuals born after 1987 must furnish citizenship proof of either parent, while those born after 2003 must submit documents for both parents.
The condition that those born before 1987 must prove their parents’ citizenship was termed a denial of voting rights. Excluding citizens for lack of documents, it said, violates constitutional guarantees.
“This stipulation effectively excludes large numbers of people from marginalised communities, women, the poor, Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), and non-resident Indians, who may not be able to produce such records,” the resolution stated.
Pointing to the Bihar SIR, where many names were removed arbitrarily, the resolution expressed fear of a similar “politics of exclusion” spreading across the country.
The resolution also noted that the SIR appeared to be a “backdoor attempt” to implement the National Register of Citizens (NRC). It recalled the nationwide protests against the NRC and CAA, and noted that the BJP had dropped the NRC from its 2024 manifesto after backlash.
“The constitutional validity of the Bihar SIR is already before the Supreme Court. To hastily replicate the same exercise in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal, where elections are imminent, cannot be considered innocent,” the Assembly said.
The move, it added, has cast suspicion on the ECI’s intentions, fueling fears that the revision is aimed at undermining the people’s mandate. The resolution further warned that the SIR could be misused by forces seeking to revive the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which links citizenship to religion.
“Using the SIR to dust off such discriminatory legislation poses a direct challenge to democracy itself,” it said.
Political parties across the spectrum had earlier urged the ECI to defer the exercise until after the local body polls, and to use the most recent electoral rolls as the base instead of the outdated 2002 list. They had also requested that ration cards be added to the list of valid identification documents.
On 21 September, Chief Electoral Officer Rathan U Kelkar recommended to the ECI that the SIR in Kerala be postponed until after the local elections due by 21 December, pointing out that the same officials would be required to serve as returning officers. The ECI’s final decision is still awaited.
Concluding the debate, the Kerala Assembly unanimously demanded that the ECI conduct voter list revisions in a “transparent, fair, and democratic manner” without infringing upon fundamental rights.
(Edited by Muhammed Fazil with inputs from Dileep V Kumar and Sreelakshmi Soman.)
