Bhubaneswar: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has set the stage for Phase III of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), expanding the massive electoral roll verification exercise to 16 states and 3 Union Territories in a phased manner—a move that will now bring the entire country under its ambit.

The Commission, in its latest press release, underlined that the schedule has been carefully aligned with the ongoing Census house-listing operations, given the shared field machinery. The synchronization, officials say, is aimed at avoiding administrative overlap while ensuring a thorough verification drive.

Nationwide scale: Boots on the ground

This phase marks one of the largest voter verification drives in recent years:

· 3.94 lakh Booth Level Officers (BLOs) will conduct door-to-door verification

· Covering 46.73 crore electors

· Assisted by 3.42 lakh Booth Level Agents (BLAs) appointed by political parties during enumeration

With this, the SIR exercise—already covering 13 states and 59 crore electors in the first two phases—will now span the entire country, turning into a full-scale democratic audit of voter rolls.
The 3rd phase will be rolled out in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, DNH &DD, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Delhi, Odisha, Punjab, Sikkim, Tripura , Telangana, Uttarakhand.

Odisha Focus: Tight timelines, intense groundwork

In Odisha, the exercise comes with a compressed but clearly defined timeline, placing administrative machinery on high alert.

· Qualifying date: July 1, 2026

· Training of staff: May 29

· House-to-house verification: May 30 – June 28

· Polling station rationalisation: June 28

The next stages move swiftly into the legal and claims process:

· Draft electoral roll publication: July 5

· Filing of claims & objections: July 5 – August 4

· Disposal/notice phase: July 5 – September 2

· Final electoral roll publication: September 6

As per official data, Odisha has 3,34,33,659 electors (as on May 12).

The deletion factor: 9.8 lakh names already struck off

Significantly, even before the formal SIR exercise, a pre-revision mapping drive led to the deletion of 9.8 lakh voters in Odisha.

According to the Chief Electoral Officer, RS Gopalan, the removals were carried out on two primary grounds:

· Death of electors

· Displacement/migration

This backdrop adds a layer of scrutiny to the upcoming revision, especially as door-to-door verification begins.

The larger picture: Accuracy vs anxiety

Phase III is not just administrative expansion—it is a decisive final sweep. With nearly half the country’s electorate being physically verified in this phase alone, the exercise aims to tighten electoral integrity.

But the scale will also see familiar concerns and contestations like:

· Risk of wrongful deletions

· Dependence on ground-level verification

· Political oversight through BLAs

Bottom line

From 3.94 lakh officials knocking on doors to nearly 37 crore voters under review, Phase III of SIR is a logistical marathon.

In Odisha, where nearly 10 lakh names have already been pruned, the upcoming weeks will determine whether the final rolls reflect precision—or provoke fresh contestation.

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