07 October,2026 11:56 AM IST | Mumbai | mid-day online correspondent
Maharashtra CM Fadnavis said a clean electoral roll was essential for a fair election. File Pic
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Wednesday defended the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, saying voters should understand how the exercise can help protect the rights of genuine voters.
In a post on X, CM Fadnavis said the SIR process was important to ensure that every voter's ballot was used only by the person entitled to cast it.
Fadnavis raised concerns about whether votes could be cast in the name of another voter or whether votes could be cast in the names of deceased electors.
"Is someone else voting in your name? Is bogus voting taking place in the names of deceased voters? There is only one answer to all this - SIR," he wrote in the post.
He said the public needed to understand how the process could address such concerns and protect the rights of ordinary voters.
The Maharashtra Chief Minister said duplicate entries and voting in the names of deceased persons were serious concerns for the electoral process.
According to Fadnavis, such irregularities could undermine the value of votes cast by eligible citizens and weaken the democratic process.
He said the SIR exercise would help identify and remove such irregularities and make electoral rolls "clean, accurate and reliable".
Fadnavis said a clean electoral roll was essential for a fair election.
He also urged voters to support the SIR process, saying that backing the exercise meant protecting the rights of every eligible citizen.
The Election Commission has been conducting SIR across several states, with the exercise becoming a major political issue amid Opposition concerns over the process and its implications for voters.
INDIA bloc leaders on Tuesday marched towards the Election Commission headquarters in New Delhi, demanding the removal of CEC Gyanesh Kumar.
The Opposition MPs were stopped by barricades from entering Nirvachan Sadan. Several leaders, including Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Congress general secretary KC Venugopal, then staged a sit-in at Akashvani Bhavan, around 100 metres from the Election Commission office.
Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and several other leaders were later detained by Delhi Police.
Congress MPs Pawan Khera, KC Venugopal and Amarinder Singh Raja Warring were among those detained. Delhi Police also detained several Youth Congress and NSUI leaders, including Indian Youth Congress president Uday Bhanu Chib, outside Akashvani Bhavan.
