Obstacle race: On Special Intensive Revision exercise
Opposition parties and citizens have protested against the Election Commission of India's Special Intensive Revision exercise, alleging it has led to the mass disenfranchisement of millions of voters. The editorial criticizes the ECI for implementing flawed, exclusionary procedures that place an undue burden on citizens to prove their eligibility to remain on electoral rolls.
Why it matters
The integrity of electoral rolls is fundamental to democratic legitimacy; mass deletion of voters without transparent verification threatens the fairness of the electoral process in the world's largest democracy.
On Gandhiji’s birth anniversary , many Opposition parties, student groups and other citizens took to the streets in Delhi, Mumbai and elsewhere demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar. Their grievance was that Mr. Kumar has presided over a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise meant to “clean” the electoral rolls, but in practice has become an exercise in the serial disenfranchisement of lakhs of Indian citizens. The BJP-led Union and State governments reacted predictably, refusing permission for the protest and imposing prohibitory orders. In Delhi, the government shut down the Internet in the Jantar Mantar area, closed 11 Metro stations and detained over 700 protesters. In Mumbai, the police denied permission for the gathering at Shivaji Park, but the protesters turned up anyway. The reason for the anger is plain.
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