ECI mulls house-to-house verification for electoral roll revision in Bihar

The Election Commission is contemplating intensive house-to-house verification during the revision of electoral rolls for the upcoming Bihar assembly polls due later this year, sources said on Sunday.

Concerns have been raised by various civil society organisations, political parties and others persistently over the inclusion or deletion of names in the electoral rolls. Parties, including the Congress, have accused the poll authority of fudging data to help the BJP.

Officials lamented that despite following a detailed protocol, insinuations and allegations are often made against the EC for arbitrarily inflating the electoral roll, even though the exercise is conducted with complete transparency and under constant scrutiny of the political parties.

To make the system robust and free of any kind of errors, the poll panel is contemplating an intensive house-to-house verification during the upcoming electoral roll revision before Bihar assembly polls to "purify" the electoral rolls, sources said.

Such intensive and rigorous revision of the electoral rolls has been done in the past as well with the last such exercise undertaken in 2004, they pointed out.

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