Voters, new applicants have to establish lineage: CEO
Shillong, May 12: The state government has made all preparations for the upcoming Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and is awaiting announcement of the schedule for the exercise in Meghalaya.
“Whenever the schedule for Meghalaya is announced by the Election Commission of India, we will go ahead with it,” Chief Electoral Officer Dr BDR Tiwari told reporters on Tuesday.
Underling importance of the exercise, he said SIR is a mandatory, full verification of the voter list and it has already been completed in Bihar and 12 other states.
Tiwari outlined the process that includes citizenship cut-offs under Indian Citizenship Act, saying, “First is July 1, 1987. Whoever is born in India before that, they are Indian citizens by birth.”
Since Meghalaya’s last SIR was in 2005, the December 2004 electoral roll will be used as a reference point. “Whoever’s name is there, they just serve the lineage,” Tiwari explained.
He said both existing voters and new applicants above 18 will have to establish lineage. “Parents or grandparents should be voters. They have to produce records of their parents, grandparents along with proof of identity,” he said. The ECI has already notified the list of acceptable identity documents.
“Meghalaya is also ready for the SIR exercise as per the schedule announced by ECI,” Tiwari said.
Calling it a routine exercise, he added, “SIR is mandatory. It has been taken up in several states. This is not the first time; it has happened several times in the country.”
On preparedness, Tiwari said the full election machinery is in place. “The BLOs, supervisors, EROs, AROs, all election functionaries are already there. Whatever manpower is required from the election side, we are ready.”
He, however, flagged the slow appointment of Booth Level Agents (BLAs) by political parties in the state. “We keep on requesting political parties to appoint BLAs but somehow that progress is not very proactive,” he said.
“It reflects their confidence in the state election functionaries. Earlier also they had no complaints regarding election machinery.”
A system-level review using the 2005 SIR data shows strong coverage. “We did the table-top exercise and found around 80% names have been verified in the state. That is good in respect to our state,” Tiwari said.
Dismissing concerns of bias, he said, “I cannot comment on that but no such complaints have been proven. Everything happens in a very transparent, free and fair manner throughout the country. We are very confident it will be as per law.”
Tiwari added that the SIR schedule will follow the ongoing census.
“The census operation is already ongoing as notified. The schedule for SIR will be announced subsequently by the ECI.”
