New Delhi, Aug 20 (IANS) In a letter to the Election Commission of India (ECI), Congress leaders from Uttarakhand on Thursday reiterated their allegation of a significant number of Form‑7 applications, seeking objection to proposed inclusion or deletion of names from electoral rolls, being submitted by “a small number of individuals” amidst the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the state.
They alleged that these are being filed in “extraordinarily large numbers”, seeking “the deletion of names of genuine, verified electors, without any corresponding physical complaint, verifiable identity, or credible basis being placed on record”.
Such “bulk objections are being received and processed” in violation of stipulated rules and procedures, without any notice to “electors whose names are sought to be deleted; and a software‑driven Demographically/Photo Similar Entries (DSE/PSE) exercise has been restarted mid‑SIR without disclosed legal basis,” they claimed.
“Taken together, they disclose a systemic vulnerability capable of resulting in the wrongful and irreversible disenfranchisement of genuine electors at a scale that no single Chief Electoral Officer or District Election Officer can be left to address in isolation,” they added.
The letter mentioned that the leaders had earlier made submissions before the state Chief Electoral Officer and other relevant authorities in this regard, claiming that “no effective corrective intervention appears to have been undertaken”, thus forcing them to take it up with the Election Commission of India in Delhi.
The petition sought that the poll body verify and record an objector’s own constituency of enrolment and his locus to object to the entry in question, and that the person facing removal from the roll is heard before disposing of any such complaint. Otherwise, it will amount to a violation of election rules, they contended.
“An analysis of the Form‑10 data (the register of claims and objections) issued by the office of the Chief Electoral Officer, Uttarakhand, for all Assembly Constituencies, from the date of draft publication up to 6 August 2026, reveals that a total of 262 individual objectors have each filed more than 10 Form‑7 objections; between them, these 262 persons alone have lodged several thousand objections seeking deletion of electors,” the letter added.
Claiming that the single largest numbers of objections are concentrated in a “handful of Assembly Constituencies”, the party attached these names and also those of “all 262 objectors who have filed more than 10 objections each”.
The representation urged the Election Commission to take cognisance of the complaint and take appropriate steps, including legal action against objectors making false declarations under the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, as well as disciplinary measures against officers improperly processing objections.
The petition further requested the Commission to immediately halt or suspend the disposal of Form‑7 objections and deletions in Uttarakhand until it conducts independent verification and an audit.
–IANS
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