Bengaluru, June 25 (IANS) The Karnataka unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday urged the Election Commission of India (ECI) to exercise its Constitutional powers under Article 324 and immediately issue directions to the Karnataka State Election Commission (SEC) to halt the separate revision exercise being undertaken in the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) wards.
The BJP delegation led by Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Council Chalavadi Narayanaswamy submitted the complaint and also forwarded a copy to the ECI, urging immediate action.
The party delegation submitted a complaint to Chief Electoral Officer V. Anbu Kumar, seeking urgent intervention against what it termed a “parallel, unauthorised and conflicting” Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process initiated by the Karnataka SEC.
According to the complaint, the BJP also requested that any grievances, findings or recommendations identified by the State Election Commission be integrated into the ECI’s statewide SIR process scheduled to commence on June 30, thereby ensuring administrative uniformity, fiscal responsibility and clarity for voters.
The ECI, through an official notification, has already mandated Phase-III of a comprehensive SIR exercise across 16 states, including Karnataka.
The BJP said that, as per the ECI’s notified schedule, the electoral rolls for Assembly constituencies in Karnataka were frozen on June 16, to maintain data integrity during the revision process, the complaint said.
However, the BJP alleged that despite the ongoing nationwide SIR exercise, the Karnataka State Election Commission issued an order on June 19, directing an independent SIR exercise based on complaints received from local political parties.
According to the complaint, the SEC froze ward-level electoral rolls as of April 18, 2026, for 27 wards falling under the Gandhinagar and Mahadevapura Assembly constituencies and planned to commence field operations from June 26.
The BJP contended that the simultaneous conduct of two voter revision exercises involving the same electorate would create confusion among voters and administrative complications.
The party said that launching a localised field revision exercise under the SEC from June 26, followed by the ECI’s statewide house-to-house enumeration from June 30, would result in repeated verification of the same voters by different authorities, potentially creating uncertainty and panic among citizens.
The complaint also said that deploying separate teams of Booth Level Officers (BLOs) and administrative personnel within a span of a few days for the same households would amount to a waste of public funds, government resources and administrative manpower.
Citing Sections 13B and 23 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, the BJP said that the authority to register, include or delete names from electoral rolls is vested solely with Electoral Registration Officers designated by the ECI.
The party alleged that the State Election Commission lacked the legal mandate to conduct a separate and parallel SIR process while the ECI’s statutory exercise was already underway.
The BJP said that any parallel mechanism undertaken without the explicit concurrence of the ECI could compromise the uniformity, integrity and legal sanctity of the electoral process.
–IANS
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