Bihar Electoral Roll Revision: Timing Triggers Trust Deficit
Image credit X @BJD
Critics Question Motives as EC Launches Intensive Verification Drive Months Before Assembly Polls
By MANISH ANAND
NEW DELHI, July 1, 2025 – The Election Commission of India (ECI) has long faced criticism for appearing active only during election seasons. That reputation is being reinforced yet again, as the Commission deploys nearly a lakh booth-level workers across Bihar to verify the credentials of voters who entered the electoral roll post-2003.
The sudden and intensive “Special Electoral Roll Revision” has sparked a wave of scepticism, with critics calling it a veiled attempt to implement a backdoor National Register of Citizens (NRC). Dipankar Bhattacharya, General Secretary of the CPI (ML), has warned that the move could disenfranchise large sections of voters in Bihar.
The timing has deepened suspicions. Bihar heads into a high-stakes Assembly election in November. Incumbent Chief Minister Nitish Kumar shows signs of political fatigue, while the BJP, his coalition partner, is bereft of a statewide face. Most of its leaders are district-level figures, a reflection of the party’s strategic shift to sideline emerging regional satraps.
Meanwhile, the Opposition—led by the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)—has mounted an aggressive campaign, promising monthly welfare schemes like ₹3,000 for women and ₹1,500 for senior citizens. In response, the NDA government has been on a spree of counter-announcements to match the Opposition’s populist promises.
But it’s the electoral roll revision’s timeline that is drawing the most attention: just one month to verify more than 7.64 crore voters. This, despite the fact that the state’s Chief Electoral Officer had already released a revised electoral roll as recently as January 2025—just five months ago. The hurried nature of the revision invites questions about planning and the potential waste of taxpayer money.
Conducting door-to-door verification of nearly 7.64 crore voters in a single month is an audacious, if not unrealistic, goal. Critics point to the example of the Bihar government’s caste survey, which was widely reported to be error-ridden and inconsistent. That survey’s credibility suffered so much that even leaders from the ruling Janata Dal (United) expressed doubts—especially after the influential Kurmi community, seen as Nitish Kumar’s core support base, was recorded at only 3%, far below the expected 7%.
Moreover, the timing coincides with the peak of the Monsoon, which, according to the Indian Meteorological Department, has now fully covered the state. Bihar’s notorious monsoon conditions severely hamper movement—many rural areas are accessible only by boat. Conducting such a vast survey under these conditions raises serious logistical and operational concerns.
To be clear, electoral roll revisions before elections are not new. Delhi underwent a similar process ahead of its Assembly elections. However, the Bihar exercise differs crucially—it imposes a cut-off date for voter entry, unlike Delhi’s more open-ended approach.
Most significantly, the ECI appears out of touch with Bihar’s demographic reality. The state has the highest rate of internal migration in India. In many villages, only elderly family members remain, while the working-age population resides in faraway states. Expecting migrant workers to return home solely to present documents for verification is not just impractical—it could effectively strip them of their democratic right to vote.
In its current form, the revision risks reducing voter participation by introducing administrative and logistical hurdles that many may be unable—or unwilling—to overcome. Without urgent course correction, the ECI may find itself complicit in suppressing, rather than enabling, democratic participation in one of India’s most politically dynamic states.
(This is an opinion piece. Views expressed are solely those of the author.)
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