
Today in Politics: Supreme Court to hear batch of petitions challenging Bihar SIR
A bench of Justices Surya Kant, Ujjal Bhuyan and N Kotiswar Singh last week said it would begin hearing these pleas on Tuesday.
The Association For Democratic Reforms, which has challenged the June 24 order of the EC directing the SIR in Bihar, had last week filed a fresh application seeking direction to the poll panel to publish the names of around 65 lakh deleted voters with the mention whether they are dead, permanently migrated or not considered for any other reason.
In its reply to the Association for Democratic Reforms' application, the EC said the draft roll had been published on the basis of the enumeration forms received and that 'no inquiry' had been done at this stage.
In its reply filed late Saturday night, the commission cited the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, which say that a copy of the draft roll is to be made available for inspection outside the Electoral Registration Officer's office and the ERO is required to make each part of the draft accessible to the public in the respective areas, and give two copies to each recognised party.
'That it is an admitted position that the Respondent has complied with the aforestated obligations. It is submitted that the statutory framework does not require the Respondent to prepare or share any separate list of names of people not included in the draft electoral rolls, or publish the reasons for non-inclusion of anyone in the draft electoral rolls for any reason,' the EC said.
Andhra local body polls
With local body polls to be held in Andhra Pradesh's Pulivendula and Vontimitta on Tuesday, the Opposition YSRCP has accused Telugu Desam Party (TDP) Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu 'conspiring' against the party.
Former minister V Srinivas alleged that Naidu was 'misusing police and TDP supporters to influence the outcome'. 'Naidu is orchestrating conspiracies to thwart YSRCP's win in the Pulivendula and Vontimitta local body polls. Such tactics will ultimately fail,' Srinivas claimed.
Srinivas claimed that peaceful elections would make a TDP victory impossible, accusing Naidu of turning the development-focused Pulivendula into a 'political battleground driven by vendetta.' He further alleged that the NDA coalition government had plunged Andhra Pradesh into chaos within a year, 'resorting to looting, atrocities, false SC/ST cases, and relocating polling booths to restrict voting rights.'
On Tuesday, Zilla Parishad Territorial Constituency elections will be held in Pulivendula and Vontimitta in the YSR Kadapa district. The region is considered a stronghold of the YSRCP – former CM Jagan Mohan Reddy is the sitting three-time MLA from Pulivendula.
BJD protests in Odisha
After holding a series of protests in Odisha over women's safety, the Opposition Biju Janata Dal (BJD) is intensifying its agitation on Tuesday with a padyatra.
While a 20-year-old FM College woman student died at AIIMS Bhubaneswar of self-immolation on the night of July 14 protesting denial of justice over a sexual harassment case, the minor girl of Balanga area in Puri district died on August 2 at AIIMS, Delhi after being allegedly set ablaze by three miscreants on July 19. The Opposition parties have been agitating over the two incidents for some time.
On Tuesday, the party's padayatra will begin from the spot where the girl was set afire at Balanga to Nimapara.
– With PTI inputs
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The Hindu
an hour ago
- The Hindu
SIR of Bihar's electoral rolls and its political ripple effects
The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in Bihar has raised concerns about possible disenfranchisement of migrant voters. Bihar, along with Uttar Pradesh, is a key source of outmigrants, and people from these two States are relocating in large numbers. This mobility is visible across the country. While it was evident during the COVID-19 pandemic, there is little data to document it. The last Census was in 2011. The 2027 Census will capture these migration patterns of the last 15 years, but there are proxy data sets and recent sample surveys that give insights into where people are going and from where. The Election Commission of India (ECI) is clear that one of the objectives of the SIR is to eliminate migrants who have relocated out of the State from Bihar's electoral rolls. The concerns regarding migrant voting rights is misplaced, for the simple reason that they are supposed to be voters where they have migrated to — where they are ordinarily residents. The Bihar SIR is an experiment in determining whether one can vote, and where one can vote; whether one is a citizen, and where one is a resident. This experiment in both demographic accounting and engineering will have many political implications, far beyond Bihar. Changing the demographic composition of constituencies is one way of influencing electoral outcomes. A citizen from Bihar voting in Bihar and voting in Maharashtra or Kerala will have different implications for the national political map. By enforcing the law on residency and voting, the ECI is trying to fast-track the political implication of population shifts. People move from where there are more of them to where there are fewer; and they move from places of poor economic opportunity to places with better opportunity. Though the 2011 Census captures the direction and the quantum of this movement, the proxy data from recent years supports this — this is how we can make sense, certainly directionally, though not necessarily in absolute numbers, of where people are arriving and where they are leaving from. The first clue comes from unreserved train travel, according to a paper by the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM). A regression analysis in the paper shows a strong correlation between unreserved train travel and the migrant population. Chart 1 shows the share of passengers arriving in Maharashtra in 2023 with unreserved tickets, based on their departure stations. Such travel is common between neighbouring States, as people from border districts often use this mode to cross the border with a strong possibility of returning to their homes the same day. Therefore, unreserved train travel between States that do not share a border becomes a stronger proxy for migration. About 50% of travellers with unreserved tickets originate within Maharashtra, followed by 12.3% from Gujarat and 5.4% from Karnataka — both neighbouring States (Chart 1). The two non-neighbouring States among the top five points of origin are Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, each accounting for over 7%, which clearly shows the direction of migrants from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh to Maharashtra. Another measure is the ratio of savings account balances to current account balances. A current account, typically operated by businesses, offers features that a savings account does not. The districts with low savings-to-current account ratios are typically cities with high levels of economic activity which attract migrants. In Mumbai (0.56), Delhi (2.24), and Bengaluru (2.21), the ratio was much lower compared with the national median (3.72). In contrast, cities with relatively higher savings-to-current account ratios are seen as having limited economic activity. For instance, many districts in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have a higher ratio, indicating possible outmigration. Map 2 shows the district-level average ratio of savings account deposits to current account deposits from 2017-18 to 2022-23. Many southern capitals such as Chennai, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad, as well as industrial hubs such as Tiruppur and Coimbatore, stand out in blue, indicating possible in-migration. A study by the State Planning Commission of Tamil Nadu, conducted in November–December 2024, surveyed migrant workers in Chennai and three neighbouring districts and found that 35% of them were from Bihar, 20% from Odisha and 16% from the northeast (Chart 3). Another dataset reflecting this trend comes from an analysis of migrant labourers who returned to their home towns from Tamil Nadu in trains during the pandemic lockdown. The analysis, published on the IIM Bangalore website, shows that most (30%) passengers leaving Tamil Nadu were bound for Bihar. These migrant populations turn permanent residents of their host States through a gradual process, but the residency rule enforcement could possibly accelerate the process. The political character and electoral dynamics respond to the changing composition of the population. In Delhi and Mumbai, migrants from the Hindi belt are now a decisive political constituency, and parties respond accordingly. In the U.S. and the U.K., politicians of Indian origin emerged on the national stage corresponding to the rise of their population in the country. Bihar SIR's politics will ripple far beyond the borders of the State. Source: EAC-PM and the Tamil Nadu State Planning Commission


Indian Express
2 hours ago
- Indian Express
‘Abhi picture baki hai': Rahul Gandhi hints at more evidence of ‘vote theft'
Continuing his offensive against the Election Commission over claims of irregularities in electoral rolls, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday said 'abhi picture baki hai (the movie is not over yet)', hinting that there might be more evidence of 'vote chori' with him. The Congress MP is learnt to have told a meeting of senior party leaders that he has details of irregularities on more than 40 seats and will release the evidence soon. Last week, Gandhi had held a press conference and said that a team constituted by the party studied poll data from Mahadevapura Assembly segment in Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat, and listed ways in which the election to the seat was 'stolen'. He alleged that the EC had colluded with the BJP in the 'vote theft'. Sources told The Indian Express that during a meeting of Congress general secretaries and in-charges in Delhi on Tuesday evening, Gandhi said he has similar data for more than 40 seats and will be releasing it soon. Earlier in the day, Gandhi accused the Election Commission of not performing its duty of enforcing the 'one man, one vote' principle. He said his party was engaged in protecting the Constitution and would continue to do so. 'There is not just one seat (where there is 'vote theft'), there are a number of seats. This is being done at a national level and systematically. The EC knows it and we know it too,' Gandhi told reporters at the Parliament House complex. 'Earlier, evidence was not there but now the evidence is there. We protect the Constitution. 'One man, one vote' is the foundation of the Constitution,' the LoP said. He said it is the EC's duty to enforce 'one man, one vote' and it has not done that. Questioned about the controversy over a '124-year-old' voter, Minta Devi, in Bihar, Gandhi said, 'There are unlimited cases like that. Abhi picture baki hai.' During his press briefing last week, Gandhi had alleged that the 'vote manipulation' did not happen in just one Assembly segment (Mahadevapura), but that there was a pattern. 'We have studied the pattern. We are convinced this crime is being committed at a huge scale across the country in state after state after state,' Gandhi said, adding that this was why exit polls and internal surveys of parties 'go massively wrong'. 'Not giving machine-readable voter lists and disallowing CCTV footage by changing the law convinced us that the EC colluded with the BJP to steal elections,' he said. He also accused the EC of looking to 'destroy' evidence of 'vote theft' across the country. On Monday, Opposition MPs took out a protest march from the Parliament House to the Election Commission office against the revision of electoral rolls in Bihar and alleged 'vote chori'. They were stopped midway by the police and briefly detained amid high drama.


Indian Express
2 hours ago
- Indian Express
Today in Politics: Bengal chief secy may appear before EC to ‘explain' Mamata govt's decision not to suspend ‘erring officials'
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