‘Unusual’ names, details appear in voter list for MLC polls in UP; ECI reports a software error

Police officials checking vehicle information on the eve of Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council (MLC) elections in Prayagraj | Photo credit: ANI

Entries like “Ram ne Yadav ko maara”, “Ram ne Sharma ko maara” as names and “B.Com” instead of the voter’s father’s name appeared in the electoral roll for the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council elections, prompting the Election Commission of India (ECI) to issue a clarification on the irregularities.

Irregularities were detected in the Allahabad-Jhansi Graduate Constituency ahead of polling for 11 MLC seats on Friday (October 23, 2026).

The list of irregularities in the voter list was shared on various social media platforms, prompting a response from the polling panel.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer Navdeep Rinwa on Thursday acknowledged the errors, saying 158 entries out of 14.81 million names in electoral rolls for 11 constituencies contained details that appeared “unusual”.

He said the errors represented a very small proportion of voters and in a few cases were related to the translation of names using software introduced to prepare electoral rolls online.

Digitally for the first time

For the first time in Uttar Pradesh, the process of preparing electoral rolls for graduate and teaching constituencies has been done digitally, replacing the earlier system of manual preparation at the district level.

Developed by the Electoral Office’s IT team in about four months, the platform includes voter registration, application processing, approval and rejection, duplicate checking, serialization and download of voter lists.

Mr Rinwa said the software was designed to transcribe names entered in English into Hindi. However, in some cases he translated the words instead, leading to incorrect notations.

For example, if “Ramhit Yadav” was mistakenly entered as “Ram hit Yadav”, the software could translate it into Hindi as “Ram ne Yadav ko maara”.

He said the errors could have been corrected using the edit option, but some remained in the final list.

However, the entry showing “B.Com” as the father’s name appears to be human error or carelessness, Mr. Rinwa said.

Request ordered

Following complaints from political parties and the circulation of lists of various irregularities on social media, Mr Rinwa ordered an investigation into the cases. An investigation conducted by Jhansi Divisional Commissioner Vimal Kumar Dubey confirmed the errors in the voter list.

Mr Rinwa directed the district authorities to ensure that no eligible voter is denied the right to vote due to clerical or printing errors. Presiding officers were instructed to verify the necessary documents and allow eligible voters to cast their votes. District Magistrates will be held responsible if anyone is rejected on such grounds.

Voting for five graduate and six teacher precincts takes place on Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. More than 14.81 million voters can cast their vote in 2,697 polling stations in 72 districts. There are up to 152 candidates in the fray.

Published – 23 Oct 2026 12:45 PM IST