The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday announced the schedule for Phase III of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, extending the large-scale voter verification exercise to 16 states and three Union Territories as part of its nationwide electoral roll update.
According to the Commission, the third phase will cover Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Punjab, Telangana, Jharkhand, Odisha, Uttarakhand, Tripura, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Manipur and Sikkim, along with the Union Territories of Delhi, Chandigarh, and Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.
However, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh have been excluded from the current phase due to adverse weather conditions and operational challenges linked to the ongoing Census process.
The ECI said the schedule had been designed carefully to avoid overlap with the Census house-listing exercise, as both operations rely heavily on the same field-level administrative infrastructure. Officials stated that the phased rollout would ensure better coordination and smoother execution across states.
“Once Phase III of the SIR is completed, the entire country will be covered, except for Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh,” the Commission said in an official statement.
The poll body also announced that more than 3.94 lakh Booth Level Officers (BLOs) will conduct door-to-door verification to reach nearly 36.73 crore electors during the third phase of the exercise. Delhi has also been included in Phase III, with the final electoral rolls for the national capital scheduled to be published on October 7.
Following the announcement, Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar appealed to citizens to actively participate in the revision process.
“I appeal to all electors to enthusiastically participate in Phase III of the Special Intensive Revision and fill out their enumeration forms. SIR is being conducted to ensure that only eligible voters are included in the electoral roll and that no ineligible names are included,” Kumar said.
The Special Intensive Revision is among the Election Commission’s most extensive electoral verification exercises in recent years. Earlier phases had already covered several politically significant and poll-bound states, including West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
With the launch of Phase III, the electoral roll revision exercise will now cover almost the entire country, barring the three regions where implementation has been deferred due to logistical and climatic constraints.
