In a key development before the Bihar polls, names of almost 65 lakh voters struck off the state’s draft electoral rolls have been published online after the Supreme Court’s order to make the revision process transparent.
Names Posted on Official Portals
The list of names deleted has been hosted on the websites of the state’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) and district magistrates. All the links take the users to the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) official voter service portal (voters.eci.gov.in), where the citizens can check information either by their EPIC number or by choosing their constituency booth.
A notice on the portal, written in Hindi, says: “List of voters whose names were included in the Bihar Voter List up to 2025 but are not in the Draft Roll up to 01.08.2025.”
Another note states the lists were made up by Booth Level Officers (BLOs) based on the inputs of booth-level agents of political parties and local representatives. Disgruntled citizens may file claims along with a copy of their Aadhaar card.
Supreme Court’s Deadline
The release follows the August 14 order by the Supreme Court asking the ECI to reveal the names of the 6.5 million voters deleted in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR). A bench headed by Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi fixed August 19 as the date for uploading the information and asked for a compliance report before the next hearing on August 22.
While passing its interim order, the Court emphasized that making the deletions public was essential in order to keep the public trust intact. It also directed the ECI to accept Aadhaar as valid identity documents for claims and objections and publicize the deletions widely via newspapers, TV, and social media. Yet no such advertisements had been put out by the Commission as of Sunday evening.
Machine-Readable Lists for Transparency
The downloadable PDFs, both searchable and machine-readable, have Hindi details such as serial number, EPIC number, voter’s name, relation type, relative’s name, old part and serial number, age, gender, and reason for deletion.
By Sunday evening, every district magistrate in Bihar had uploaded the lists, which was a key step towards fulfilling the Court’s order.
The decision is set to prompt indiscriminate examination, particularly in politically charged Bihar. Political parties, with polls being near, will likely scrutinize the deletions to determine whether certain elector groups have been disproportionately hurt.
For common voters, the online facility offers a chance to verify their status and raise objections if unjustly denied. The next few days will be critical as the ECI starts dealing with claims and objections before finalizing the rolls.
