16.18 lakh Form 6 applications filed during SIR enumeration phase in UP: Chief Electoral Officer

Image is for representational purposes only. | Photo credit: J. Allen Egenuse

Uttar Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer Navdeep Rinwa said on Friday (October 9, 2026) that about 16.18 lakh applications received in Form 6 without disclosure of names were submitted during the enumeration phase of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in the state and conducted as per the guidelines issued by (EKI Election Commission of India).

He was responding to a report by The Reporters’ Collective, which said these Form 6 applications, which are used for new voter registrations, had been added “mysteriously” and that the names of the applicants had not been released.

The director general claimed that the applications were processed as per ECI guidelines for the SIR exercise, according to which each Booth Level Officer (BLO) was supposed to carry 30 Form 6 applications for people who wanted to register as voters.

Unlike earlier forms

Mr Rinwa said these applications were separate from the Form 6 filed during the claims and objections period that followed the enumeration stage and, in addition to them, the list of names that was published.

He also said that the Electoral Registration Officers (ERO) filed Form 7 which are applications for deletion of names only in cases where notices have already been issued and the names have been found ineligible for various reasons.

In a separate report, The Reporters’ Collective said that during the SIR exercise in Uttar Pradesh, the ECI software automatically generated 85,854 forms to delete voters without giving any reason.

Mr. Rinwa argued that there was no mention of the reason for the deletion as notices had already been issued.

Around 3.26 lakh voters in Uttar Pradesh were issued notices during the SIR. These were voters whose details needed to be verified after the draft list of 12.55 crore was released on January 6. The first notices were issued on January 14 and hearings began on January 21. Out of a total of 3.26 million names, 1.04 million were “unmapped” voters and 2.22 million were flagged as a logical contradiction.

Coin Toss: Congress

The opposition Congress said that the right to vote has been reduced to a software-generated game of chance.

“ECI’s version of a coin toss: Heads: You are a voter. Tails: You are not,” Congress MP Pawan Khera said in a post on X.

“Apparently this is how electoral democracy works in Uttar Pradesh, where the ECI software automatically generated 85,854 voter deletion forms without giving any reason. Day by day, the indictment of the RSS-BJP-ECI nexus deepens. They have reduced the right to vote to a software-generated game of chance,” he added, mocking the Indian electorate.

Published – 9 Oct 2026 22:09 IST