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Published Nov 07, 2025 | 7:00 AM ⚊ Updated Nov 07, 2025 | 7:00 AM
First undertaken in Bihar ahead of the state assembly polls, the SIR had sparked widespread protests and opposition.
Kerala’s district collectors are learning, the hard way, what it truly means to serve two masters.
With the State Election Commission (SEC) marching toward local body polls and the Chief Electoral Office–Kerala, acting under the mighty Election Commission of India (ECI), insisting on its grand Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, the state’s top bureaucrats now find themselves trapped in an administrative tug-of-war.
The collectors, who double up as District Electoral Officers for both commissions, have suddenly discovered that democracy is not just about elections—it’s also about endurance.
The chaos began on 3 November, when CEO Rathan U Kelkar issued an order that effectively pulled the rug from under the SEC’s election preparations.
The order—dense with legalese and patriotic urgency—declared that all Booth Level Officers (BLOs) would be on full-time SIR duty from 4 November to 4 December 2025, to ensure the “accuracy and integrity” of India’s electoral rolls.
In simpler terms, every BLO—be it a teacher, office superintendent, clerk, attender, or even an Anganwadi worker—was to abandon their regular jobs and hit the streets with voter lists in hand.
The order was absolute: no departmental distractions, no side hustles, just pure enumeration. That sounded noble on paper.
But for Kerala’s collectors, it meant pulling crucial manpower from the SEC’s local body election work—the most critical month of the poll calendar.
After all, around 35–40 percent of BLOs came from the Local Self Government (LSG) Department, which also happens to be the backbone of the local polls.
The SEC, led by A Shajahan, was not amused.
Within 24 hours, the CEO’s order was quietly rewritten.
The new version, issued on 3 November itself, clarified—with bureaucratic grace—that the previous instruction “would not be applicable to those officers and staff engaged by the State Election Commission in connection with the ensuing general elections to Local Self Government Institutions, 2025.”
The U-turn, it’s learnt, came after a round of administrative fireworks and frantic phone calls from collectors who suddenly found themselves unable to run both elections and revisions simultaneously.
The two commissions, sensing the confusion, decided to call a truce.
A joint online meeting was soon convened—Kerala’s very own version of a peace summit—featuring CEO Kelkar and State Election Commissioner Shajahan, with all 14 district collectors in attendance.
The meeting, according to official press handouts, was conducted in perfect harmony.
Both leaders solemnly agreed that “the preparation of voter lists and conduct of elections are constitutional obligations of both institutions and should proceed without hindrance.”
Collectors were told to balance both responsibilities “smoothly,” a term that surely earned a wry smile or two from the attendees.
Kelkar, in an attempt to ease the tension, instructed collectors to simply replace any BLOs who were also doing local election work.
Easy—just find hundreds of equally trained substitutes in a week’s time.
Thus began the great bureaucratic juggling act.
Collectors are now racing to recruit temporary BLOs from other departments while ensuring that the SIR enumeration runs on schedule—and that the SEC’s local body poll machinery doesn’t grind to a halt.
The irony, of course, is that both the SIR and the elections claim to uphold the same democratic spirit—accuracy, participation, and fairness.
But on the ground, democracy is colliding with logistics.
The CEO’s order read like a constitutional sermon—citing Article 324, Section 13B(2) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and reminding everyone that BLOs, during their deputation, function under the ECI’s “superintendence, direction, and control.”
But the SEC’s counteraction reminded the state that elections aren’t just about New Delhi’s authority—they’re about Kerala’s local governance, too.
And so, both sides released separate press handouts—each diplomatically worded but clearly aimed at calming nerves.
The press handouts from both offices were textbook examples of bureaucratic diplomacy.
The CEO’s note said that both the SIR and local elections would proceed “without operational overlap,” and that staff engaged in one exercise would not be disturbed by the other.
The SEC, in its statement, echoed the same sentiment — adding, perhaps with crossed fingers, that “arrangements will be made to ensure smooth conduct of both processes.”
Behind the polished prose, however, lies the collectors’ daily headache: keeping two commissions happy while ensuring that electoral rolls are revised, nominations are filed, and nobody accidentally counts the same booth twice.
All major political parties in Kerala—except the BJP—had warned earlier that conducting the SIR alongside the local body elections would create confusion.
Now, their prophecy seems to be playing out in real time.
Collectors, those stoic middlemen of governance, are left to do administrative gymnastics, hoping to keep both Delhi and Thiruvananthapuram happy.
For now, the district collectors of Kerala continue their delicate dance — one step to the rhythm of Delhi’s directives, the next to Thiruvananthapuram’s tune.
Whether this bureaucratic ballet ends in harmony or a tangle of forms remains to be seen.
After all, the electoral process in Kerala, it seems, now comes with a footnote: handled by collectors, under dual supervision.
