Sikkim publishes draft electoral roll, begins claims and objections process ahead of final voter list

The Sikkim Election Department on July 5 published the draft electoral roll under the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR), marking the completion of the enumeration phase and the commencement of the claims and objections process ahead of the final publication of the revised voter list on September 6.

Addressing a press briefing, Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Raj Kumar Yadav said the SIR exercise began on May 20, with Booth Level Officers (BLOs) completing the house-to-house verification on June 28. The draft electoral roll was compiled between June 28 and July 5 before being shared with recognised political parties and uploaded on the CEO's official website for public access.

According to the CEO, the draft electoral roll records around 37,000 deletions, while approximately 4.33 lakh electors have been included. To facilitate voter verification, the department has introduced QR codes that allow electors to check their details online using either their EPIC number or name.

As part of the revision exercise, the Election Department has also added 53 new polling stations, reducing the number of voters attached to each polling booth to below 1,200 to improve administrative efficiency.

To oversee the verification process, the department has appointed 48 Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and 27 Additional Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs), while the Election Commission of India has deployed three Roll Observers to monitor the exercise across the state's six districts.

Clarifying concerns over the large number of notices issued during the revision, Yadav said nearly 88,000 to 90,000 notices have been served. Of these, around 38,000 were issued to individuals whose names were absent from the baseline 2002 electoral roll, while nearly 50,000 notices relate to discrepancies such as mismatched names or surnames.

He stressed that receiving a notice does not automatically result in deletion from the electoral roll. Instead, it provides an opportunity for voters to establish their eligibility by submitting valid documents before the designated ERO or AERO during the hearing process.

The CEO also urged voters whose names may have been inadvertently omitted from the draft roll to apply for inclusion by submitting Form 6 along with supporting documents through their respective BLOs.

To facilitate public participation, special verification camps will be organised at polling stations on July 11, 12, 25 and 26, where BLOs will accept applications for inclusion, correction, transposition and deletion of names.

The Election Department has prescribed 11 categories of acceptable documents for verification and encouraged all eligible voters to carefully verify their details and complete the necessary formalities before the final electoral roll is published on September 6.