The Election Commission’s controversial ‘special intensive revision’ of the electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar came to a close on September 30 as the poll body released the final voter list which revealed that the total number of electors in the state has shrunk by about 6% – 47 lakh electors. While the poll body has said that a total of 68.66 lakh voters had been deleted during the exercise while another 21.53 lakh were added, it has provided no numerical break down of why these deletions were made. It has not said, for instance, whether the 21.53 lakh voters added through Form 6 were all new electors or those who had filed claims and objections using the same application form following the publication of the draft electoral list. It has also not said why 3.66 lakh voters who were in the draft list were removed from the final list, and how many electors were deleted due to their failure to provide supportive documents. Though the Election Commission, while announcing the exercise on June 24, had stated that among other reasons, the SIR was necessitated due to inclusion of “foreign illegal immigrants” in the rolls, it has also not provided the numbers of such electors. Here are five questions that the Election Commission has left unanswered.Why is there no breakup of reasons for shrinkage of the voter list by 47 lakh?Through the time that the SIR was being conducted, the Election Commission had provided daily press releases in which it listed voters who were found to be dead, to have shifted, or to have been registered in more than one place. Its draft electoral roll published on August 1, which included 65 lakh deletions too provided this breakup and said, 22 lakh voters were declared deceased, 36 lakh permanently shifted or not found, and seven lakh had duplicate entries in multiple places. The Election Commission in its statement on September 30 has simply said that there were 7.89 crore electors when the SIR was announced on June 24, which then decreased to 7.24 crore when the draft roll was published on August 1 with 65 lakh deletions, which further went down to 7.42 crore in the final roll. In terms of a break down, the Election Commission statement only states that “ineligible electors removed from draft list” were 3.66 lakh while 21.53 lakh “eligible electors [were] added in draft list (Form 6)”.The reasons for deletion remain missing from the Election Commission’s statement despite the Supreme Court asking the poll body on August 14, to publish on its website the list of names excluded from the draft electoral rolls, along with the reasons for deletion.Why were 3.66 lakh voters deleted from the draft list?The final roll published on September 30, according to the Election Commission, includes 3.66 voters who were “ineligible electors removed from draft list”.The statement does not clarify why these voters were included in the draft list, only to be deleted two months later. It also does not say whether they were included in the draft list without supportive documents, and then deleted for failing to provide them.Were the 21.53 lakh voters added through the use of Form 6 for new voters, or were they those who filed claims and objections?The Election Commission’s statement on September 30 says that 21.53 lakh “eligible electors” were added in the draft list and then mentions “(Form 6)” in brackets.While announcing the exercise on June 24, the Election Commission’s instructions to the Bihar chief electoral officer (CEO) had stated that between August 1 and September 1 those who had failed to submit their enumeration forms with the supportive documents, could do so during the claims and objections period using Form 6 and the prescribed declaration form.Form 6 however, is also the document used for application of new voters. The statement makes no mention of whether these are new voters or those who filed applications during the claims and objections period. It also provides no figure for new voters that the three-month long exercise had found.How many of the 47 lakh voters were excluded due to lack of documents?While the Election Commission said that the electoral roll had shrunk from 7.89 crore as of June 24 to 7.42 crore in the final roll, it makes no mention of whether the 47 lakh people, who were eligible to vote just three months ago, were excluded because of lack of supportive documents necessary for the exercise.While announcing the exercise on June 24, the Election Commission had said those born before July 1, 1987 will have to prove their date and/or place of birth, those born between July 1, 1987 and December 2, 2004 will have to prove their date of birth and the date/place of birth of one of their parents, while those born after December 2, 2004 will have to prove their date/place of birth as well as that of both their parents.In order to prove this the Election Commission had provided a list of 11 documents but kept out easily available documents like Aadhaar, ration, and voter ID cards, which had emerged as a major point of contention in the exercise raising concerns of mass exclusions. Five of the 11 documents sought by the poll body do not indicate place or date of birth. The Wire has reported on how the EC has steered the SIR exercise in multiple directions when it came to the rules governing the submission of enumeration forms, the SIR’s rationale and the claims and objections deadline. Finally, after repeated refusals in court, on September 9, it announced that it would accept Aadhaar cards – only after the Supreme Court asked it to do so.How many ‘foreign illegal immigrants’ were found?While announcing the SIR on June 24, the Election Commission had said that it had been necessitated due to various reasons, among which was the inclusion of “foreign illegal immigrants” in the electoral roll.“Various reasons such as rapid urbanisation, frequent migration, young citizens becoming eligible to vote, non-reporting of deaths and inclusion of the names of foreign illegal immigrants have necessitated the conduct of an intensive revision so as to ensure integrity and preparation of error-free electoral rolls,” it said in its statement on June 24. During the exercise, the Election Commission said through sources that illegal immigrants from Nepal, Myanmar and Bangladesh have been found through this exercise.However, the poll body’s statement on September 30 makes no mention of how many such foreign illegal immigrants were found.