When players appoint the referee, the disenfranchising of Indians

Gyanesh Kumar (CEC) is a 1988-batch Kerala IAS officer and former Cooperation Secretary. He has been an EC since March 2024 and CEC since 19 February 2025, with his term running to 26 January 2029.

Sukhbir Singh Sandhu has been an EC since March 2024. Vivek Joshi, a 1989-batch Haryana IAS officer and former Haryana Chief Secretary, has been an EC since February 2025.

No. A CEC serves six years or until age 65, whichever comes first. Rajiv Kumar turned 65 and left office on 18 February 2025 after leading since May 2022. Gyanesh Kumar, the senior-most EC, was elevated the next day.

In March 2023 the Supreme Court said a panel of the PM, the Leader of the Opposition and the Chief Justice should pick commissioners until Parliament passed a law. Parliament's 2023 Act replaced the Chief Justice with a Union Cabinet minister chosen by the PM. The government now holds two of the three seats.

The rule is in Section 7 of the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023 (Act No. 49 of 2023).

In the Lok Sabha the BJP had a majority on its own (about 290 of 543), and the NDA had over 330. In the Rajya Sabha the BJP was the largest party but the NDA alone was short of a majority.

In practice neither House voted against strong opposition. The Rajya Sabha passed the bill by voice vote on 12 Dec 2023 after the opposition walked out. The Lok Sabha passed it on 21 Dec, after 146 opposition MPs across both Houses had been suspended.

Yes. The Supreme Court declined to stay it in March 2024. On 23 September 2026 a two-judge bench split on whether to send the challenge to a larger bench: Justice Datta said no and Justice Sharma said yes. The Chief Justice now decides how it proceeds. The law's validity has not been ruled on.

Yes. Rahul Gandhi, the LoP and the panel's only non-government member, filed a dissent note. He argued the decision should wait for the Supreme Court hearing on the law, which was scheduled for days later.

A CEC can be removed only like a Supreme Court judge: on proven misbehaviour or incapacity, by a special majority in both Houses. The first-ever notices, signed by 130 Lok Sabha and 63 Rajya Sabha MPs, were filed on 12 March 2026. The Speaker and Chairman rejected them on 6 April. A fresh 73-MP Rajya Sabha notice filed on 24 April is pending.

A full rebuild of the voter rolls. Instead of correcting the existing list, every registered voter has to re-qualify by returning an enumeration form, and in many cases providing documents. Anyone who doesn't complete the steps is left off the new roll.

Rolls are revised every year through a lighter "summary revision". Full intensive revisions are occasional. The last were in 2002–04 (Bihar in 2003), and that roll is now the baseline voters are matched against. The ECI's power comes from Section 21 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, which allows a special revision at any time.

What is new this time is that unmapped voters must prove eligibility with documents, and that it covers almost the whole country in about 18 months.

1. Enumeration: a Booth Level Officer delivers a pre-filled form; the voter signs and returns it within about a month.
2. Draft roll: only people who returned a form are included. The rest are listed as dead, shifted, duplicate or not found.
3. Mapping: each form is matched to the 2002–04 roll. If you or a parent appear there, you need few or no documents.
4. Notices: unmapped voters, and those flagged for "logical discrepancies", must produce an eligibility document.
5. Hearing: the Electoral Registration Officer decides inclusion or exclusion.
6. Final roll and appeals: appeals go to the District Election Officer, then the state CEO. Bengal used tribunals of judicial officers.

As proof of identity only, not citizenship. The ECI initially left it off the document list; the Supreme Court asked it to consider Aadhaar, voter ID and ration cards.

• Bihar pilot: ordered 24 June 2025; final roll 30 September 2025.
• Phase 2: 12 states and UTs including Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, from 27 October 2025.
• Phase 3: 19 states and UTs including Maharashtra, Delhi, Karnataka and Telangana, from 14 May 2026. Drafts are published; final rolls are pending.

Each phase was ordered roughly four to five months before a major round of polls. Bihar's SIR was ordered about 4.4 months before Bihar voted, and phase 2 about 4.6 months before the five-state schedule. Phase 3 began days after the May 2026 results, ahead of the 2027 round. The Supreme Court questioned the timing in July 2025 but did not stop the exercise.

About 11.7 crore across all three phases so far, from a base of roughly 95 crore electors:

• Bihar: 7.89 crore → 7.42 crore final, a net drop of 47 lakh (65 lakh dropped at draft, about 21.5 lakh added back).
• Phase 2: 50.99 crore → 45.81 crore, a drop of 5.18 crore (10.2%).
• Phase 3: over 6 crore at draft stage (17%), including 2.06 crore in Maharashtra and 32.8% of Delhi's roll. Final figures are pending.

The ECI has not published additions alongside deletions for phases 2 and 3, so net figures may shrink.

• The burden moved to the voter. A name now goes unless the voter acts, rather than staying until someone proves it should go.
• Migrants miss the window. People working away from home during the enumeration month don't return forms.
• Genuine cleanup. In phase 2, about 67 lakh dead voters were removed, plus duplicates across states caught by central de-duplication.
• Software flags at scale. Notices are generated in lakhs and must be cleared on tight deadlines.

In phase 2, only about 1.3 crore of the 5.18 crore drop is explained by deaths or adjudicated objections. The rest are mostly people not found, shifted, duplicated, or who didn't return the form.

Yes. Form 6 is labelled for new voters, but it is the application for anyone whose name is not on the roll: first-time voters, people who moved, and people who were deleted.

On 29 September 2026 the ECI told states where the SIR is complete (20 states and UTs) that excluded voters can re-apply through Form 6. The extra SIR declaration no longer applies to these applications; it is the plain statutory form. Officials must compare pre- and post-SIR rolls to find people deleted without sufficient grounds, and BLOs may visit to help them file. In Goa, 88 of 97 eligible voters left off the final roll have been restored or have applied.

• The voter has to notice and act. Someone wrongly removed must find out and re-apply as if new.
• The roll freezes before each election. Once nominations close, no one can be added for that election. Missing the cut-off means not voting in it, even if you are added later.
• The rules changed partway. Re-applicants during the SIR faced the extra declaration; those applying since 29 September do not.
• Appeals are slow. In Bengal, of 38 lakh tribunal appeals, about 1.26 lakh had been decided by September 2026.

1. Check whether you are on the current roll through the ECI's voter services portal (voters.eci.gov.in) or your state CEO's website.
2. If your state's SIR is complete and you are missing, file Form 6 online or with your BLO. Since 29 September 2026 the extra SIR declaration is not required.
3. If your state's SIR is still open (for example Delhi or Maharashtra), file a claim within the claims-and-objections window.
4. If an ERO excluded you after a hearing, you can appeal to the District Election Officer.
5. Do it well before any election is announced. The roll is frozen once nominations close.

Check your state CEO's website for the current deadlines; they vary by state and have been extended several times.

Independent analyses say yes in two places. In West Bengal, Muslims were heavily over-represented in the "logical discrepancy / under adjudication" category, with about 95% of supplementary-roll deletions in Nandigram. In Bihar, 7.6 lakh more women than men were removed. The ECI denies any bias. The figures rely on name-based inference and haven't been independently audited. See stage 3, "Patterns in who was deleted" for each claim, the ECI's response and the caveats.

Bengal set up tribunals of judicial officers to hear SIR appeals. Of 38.3 lakh appeals, 22.2 lakh were from voters who were excluded and 16.1 lakh challenged the inclusion of voters, often names judicial officers had restored. A tribunal judge said about four in ten inclusion appeals were filed by election authorities. One Supreme Court petition alleges they were filed in the ECI's name without the two ECs or the state CEO knowing.

The statutory application for inclusion in the electoral roll, prescribed by the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960. It asks you to show you are 18 or over, a citizen and ordinarily resident at the address. Changing the form itself requires the Law Ministry to amend the Rules.

1. June 2025: a separate declaration ("Annexure D") attached to Forms 6 and 8. Documents depend on birth date, following the Citizenship Act cut-offs: born before 1 July 1987 needs your own proof; 1987–2004 needs one parent's too; after 2004 needs both parents'.
2. Later phases: a question on whether you or your parents appear in the last intensive revision roll. From July 2026, new applicants must attach parents' SIR details.
3. 13 August 2026: a further question tying applicants to an earlier roll, which EC Sandhu objected to.

In practice, yes. The online Form 6 would not submit until the declaration was completed, and one OTP covered both. For online applicants the declaration was a condition of registering, and it changed the evidence needed to get on the roll.

Whether that makes it legally invalid depends on two further questions. First, the Supreme Court (May 2026) upheld the ECI's power to require a declaration during SIR, so being mandatory is not illegal in itself. Second, the later additions came after two of the three commissioners objected; if the full Commission never approved them, they may fail on process. The Court said on 5 October 2026 that it has not approved a modified Form 6 and has asked for the records.

Whether paper applications were also refused without the declaration has not been reported. If online and paper differed, applicants faced different tests depending on how they applied.

That Form 6 itself was never changed. A separate declaration was attached through the June 2025 Bihar SIR order, approved unanimously and upheld by the Supreme Court. The declaration helps map voters and reduces paperwork, and the standard form is used outside SIR periods. It called Rahul Gandhi's claim that Form 6 was changed illegally "misleading".

That ECs Sandhu and Joshi formally recorded at least 14 objections over 10 months, four on a single day, to decisions and orders they say were issued without their knowledge or against their recommendations. The objections covered new-voter registration, deletion and restoration of names, appeals, and control of the roll database. Some were escalated to the Cabinet Secretary.

The report shows the objections were raised. It does not by itself prove misconduct.

ERONet is the system Electoral Registration Officers have long used to add, remove and restore names; the law gives that job to EROs. From November 2025 their access was reportedly restricted. ECINet, launched on 22 January 2026, consolidates election services into one central platform. Joshi warned of a "gradual centralisation" of the roll database. The question is whether central IT staff, rather than statutory officers, now control roll changes.

Dated 29 July 2026, from Sandhu and Joshi, about a change in work allocation that removed a layer of oversight of the IT division. The ECI says it concerned the working of an officer on deputation, reportedly a senior Deputy EC, and not policy or the CEC.

It has not denied the notes exist. It says differing views are a normal part of deliberation and that all final decisions, including the SIR schedules, were unanimous. On 26 September 2026 all three commissioners signed a press note announcing that agendas will be circulated in advance and minutes issued, and that ECINet will be reviewed for legal compliance.

Yes, for decisions of the Commission. The 2023 Act and the Supreme Court's T.N. Seshan ruling treat the Commission as a multi-member body: business is done unanimously where possible, otherwise by majority. On 5 October 2026 the Court reiterated that decisions must be unanimous or by majority. Petitioners argue that steps taken over two commissioners' recorded objections are therefore void.

• May 2024: the ECI told the Supreme Court it could not publish booth-wise turnout (Form 17C) during the Lok Sabha polls.
• 20 Dec 2024: on the ECI's recommendation, Rule 93(2)(a) was narrowed so CCTV and video records are no longer open to public inspection. This followed a High Court order to release Haryana poll footage.
• May 2025: booths capped at 1,200 voters (from 1,500), death records fed in from the Registrar General, and mobile-phone deposit at booths.
• 30 May 2025: polling CCTV and webcast footage to be destroyed after 45 days unless an election petition is filed.
• Jun 2025 onward: the SIR and the Form 6 declaration.

• Form 17C turnout data during the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
• Aland deletion data: Karnataka CID's requests in Jan–Apr 2025 for device IP and port details went unanswered, stalling the probe.
• Maharashtra CCTV footage sought by Rahul Gandhi in June 2025, citing voter privacy and the RP Act. On machine-readable rolls, it pointed him to paying for copies under existing rules.
• "Vote chori" allegations: in August 2025 the CEC said they would be treated as baseless unless backed by an affidavit within seven days.

Not all of them. Until February 2025 Rajiv Kumar was CEC, so the 2024 items were decisions of a three-member Commission that included Gyanesh Kumar and Sandhu. The Rule 93 change was notified by the Law Ministry on the ECI's recommendation. The disputed 2025–26 steps are the ones the two ECs say were taken without them.

• Rakesh Kumar Singh's PIL: seeks the CEC's suspension, a quo warranto writ and a declaration that his unilateral actions are unauthorised.
• Shailendra Mani Tripathi's PIL: seeks to void decisions and software changes made without the full Commission, plus criminal proceedings.
• Contempt: an advocate has sought the Attorney General's consent for criminal contempt proceedings against the CEC.
• The 2023 appointments law: awaiting the Chief Justice's decision on a larger bench.
• Bengal SIR cases, including Derek O'Brien's application on tribunal appeals.

It issued notice to the ECI and the Centre with a week to reply. It said Commission decisions must be unanimous or by majority, and presumed for now that they were. It said it has not approved a modified Form 6 and sought the records. It refused interim relief against the CEC. Rahul Gandhi said the illegality was now established; the ECI and BJP called that a misreading.

Opposition parties ran nationwide protests from 26 September to 2 October. The Youth Congress protested in Delhi. INDIA bloc MPs marched to the ECI on 6 October. On 10–11 October the youth-led Cockroach Janta Party protested in Delhi amid heavy security, with over 7,000 people reported detained.

• The ECI and Centre's replies to the Supreme Court were due about a week after 5 October; the Court takes the matter up after that.
• The Chief Justice must decide whether a larger bench hears the challenge to the 2023 appointments law.
• The 73-MP removal notice remains with the Rajya Sabha Chairman.
• Phase 3 final rolls are due later in 2026; Maharashtra's claims close 12 October and Delhi's on 30 October.

Every answer links to public reporting, mostly national outlets and legal news sites. The Indian Express investigation itself was paywalled and is cited through other outlets that reported it. Some figures, such as phase 3 deletions, are draft-stage and will change. The history of earlier intensive revisions and the expected 2027 polling window are from general reference. Where the ECI disputes a claim, its position is given alongside.