While SIR is going on in 11 States of India at present, the voters’ list revamping task has yielded the maximum noise in the State of West Bengal. The ruling party showing massive resistance against SIR arguing the process to be ‘illegal’ & ‘unconstitutional’, SIR stands to be neither such, as provision thereof exists in both the Constitution of India & the Representation of People’s Act, 1950.
SIR-antagonism of West Bengal’s ruling party is in receipt of effective amplification by a section of the media rendering critical arguments beyond the domain of democratic concern. On top of all else, the mob attack on the vehicle of ECI’s Special Observer in West Bengal C. Murugan (IAS) in Magrahat of the South 24 Parganas district offered a plain glimpse of the hyper-politicized state of affairs in West Bengal.
In spite of all such primitive methods of mob mobilization prevailing on the ground, 2025-26 is a historical landmark when Bharat & the rest of the World is marching ahead each day on the developments & usage of artificial intelligence in analyzing big data, creating a stark contrast of technological progress of Bharat & attitudinal regress of a section of her populace.
While usage of AI has eased up the task of revamping the data of the Indian electors’ for the ECI, it is throwing serious challenges to human intelligence by exposing forgery, data manipulation & pre-existing involuntary errors in the voters’ data. As a result, ‘logical discrepancies’ arose solving which ECI had no other option but to ‘hear’ from the electors themselves to get rid of such ‘discrepancies’.
While such process of being served with a notice for being heard may appear harassment to some people on one hand, it is also appearing, on the other, to be an opportunity for the majority to celebrate Bharat’s fervour of democracy.
While people are used to hearing the rhetoric that casting a vote is a democratic right, SIR is adding value to the perception of such right along with a sense of responsibility of being a part of the world’s largest democracy. Identifying one’s own self as a legitimate voter with due documents is expected to increase public awareness, sense of accountability & democratic enthusiasm. As Bharat is targeting to get rid of the colonial hangover all by 2047, the ongoing SIR process is supposed to be one of the facilitators as it is showcasing the voters’ duties to present their eligibility parameters as an elector. As in the recent past, the Prime Minister of Bharat had often been heard to emphasize upon the importance of the fundamental duties as prescribed by the Constitution of India, SIR, is offering a scope to the people of Bharat to rise to a level of elevated consciousness about such fundamental duties.
SIR 2025-26, for the first time ever, is giving rise to a realization in the people of Bharat that voting is not a right for all but only for the eligible ones. SIR, thus, is ratifying the Universal Adult Suffrage as per Article 326 of the Constitution of India. Interestingly, SIR 2025-26 is the first ever exercise in the post-independence Bharat wherein eligibility of the common public is being evaluated which is certainly a landmark in the post-modern Indian history.
SIR by the Election Commission of India in 2025-26, followed by the upcoming census, would offer the Government of India to cross verify the complete population data of Bharat & such database is expected to end up helping Bharat Sarkar allocate the right budget for right cause & channelize the fund wherever required. Just the way the Government of India decided to connect all the VG-RAM-G (ex-MNREGA) projects with PM Gati Shakti, SIR data too would remain available to be connected & cross verified with the census data, with the help of AI, for developing a flawless population database of Bharat which might be used in achieving the goal of building a developed India by 2047.
