The second round of the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Review (SIR), a voter cleansing exercise, is set to begin in nine states and three Union Territories from Tuesday, November 4. The first phase of the exercise took place in Bihar. The final voter list, with nearly 7.42 million names, was released on September 30, ahead of the state assembly elections, which begin voting on November 6.
The SIR in these states and union territories with 51 million voters will end on February 7, 2026 with the publication of the final voter list. As the Electoral Commission begins its voter sweep, here are answers to all your questions.
What is SIR and why is it done?
The Special Intensive Review (SIR) is an EC initiative to ensure that electoral rolls are accurate and up-to-date.
As part of this action, election officials add the names of those who were missed and remove those who are no longer eligible — deceased, registered in multiple locations, alien removals and those who have moved.
Which states and UTs are part of the second round of SIR?
The 12 States and Union Territories where the second round of SIR will be held are:
Andaman and Nicobar Islands
Which states will go to the polls?
Among the states where SIR is or has been conducted, Bihar is going to polls on November 6, marking the first phase of voting.
Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala and West Bengal will go to polls in 2026.
In Assam, polls are due in 2026, the revision of electoral rolls will be announced separately as the state is undergoing a Supreme Court-supervised exercise to verify citizenship. A separate provision of the Citizenship Act also applied to Assam.
“Under the Citizenship Act, there are separate provisions for citizenship in Assam. Citizenship review is being completed under the supervision of the Supreme Court. The June 24 SIR order was for the entire country. In such circumstances, it would not apply to Assam,” Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar had said earlier while announcing the latest phase of SIR.
“So separate revision orders will be issued for Assam and a separate SIR date will be announced,” he said.
SIR today
Eercise of SIR in 12 states and UT will start today, November 4. It will last until December 4.
The EC will publish draft voter lists on December 9, and the final voter lists will be published on February 7.
The ongoing SIR is the ninth such exercise since independence. The last SIR was conducted more than 21 years ago in 2002-2004.
