New Delhi: More than 95,000 of the nearly 1.73 lakh Form 7 applications filed during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls have been marked as “ineligible”, Uttarakhand’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) said on Thursday (September 24).Form 7 is used to seek the deletion of a name from the electoral roll. Those who failed to secure their restoration on the electoral roll in the state failed the election commission’s “logical discrepancy” hearing or did not show up for them.State CEO B.V.R.C. Purshottam said all of the 95,000 voters were logical discrepancy cases, reports Hindustan Times. The CEO’s office clarified that the “ineligible” voters include those who failed to furnish documents for their verification or did not appear for the hearing in person or through a family member.According to the CEO, the voters marked “ineligible” will be able to seek inclusion in the electoral roll after the final publication by submitting Form 6. However, this form is meant for adding new voters – those just turning 18 or who have never voted before.Besides, Form 6 also requires documentary proof and those who claim they have been voting before but were left out due to “logical discrepancy” may not be able to prove they are first-time voters. This is apart from potentially facing legal action for misrepresenting their status as new voters.The final electoral roll in Uttarakhand will be published on October 3, just about a week from now.Also read: Delhi Police Manhandle, Detain Protesters Asking for CEC Gyanesh Kumar’s Removal at Jantar MantarThe disputes regarding the SIR process in the state begain as the draft electoral roll was published on July 14 that had 71.33 lakh fewer electors than the 79.6 lakh in the 2022 final roll.However, it is during the subsequent stage, when claims and objections were filed, that a massive number of Form 7 applications – over 1.30 lakh initially, which cumulatively grew to 1.73 lakh – were filed to delete voters. The claims and objections will be recorded until September 28.The Congress party has alleged that the deletion requests were auto-generated to flag minor errors and also worked selectively across the state’s districts to put its voters at a disadvantage. That is, the Election Commission’s ERONET software flags minor name mismatches, differences in the age of siblings or between parents and children as well as parents with more than six children as a “logical discrepancy”.A PIL being heard in the Supreme Court of India filed by transparency activists Anjali Bharadwaj and Amrita Johri raises the concern that these so-called logical discrepancies have nothing to do with the right or eligibility to vote, such as family size or minor name mismatches. Their petition relates to the mass exclusion of voters in Delhi SIR.In such cases, the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) or Assistant Electoral Registration Officer (AERO) marked these voters as “ineligible” on the Election Commission’s online system. Thereafter, Form 7 is automatically generated for their names and details to be deleted from the electoral roll. More 85% of the Form 7 applications in Uttarakhand came from Udham Singh Nagar, Haridwar, Dehradun and Nainital, just four districts, which are largely located in the plains, are more populous within the state and therefore raised questions about demographic and geographical profiling of deletions.The Congress party has said that these deletions are concentrated in areas where it has a strong voter base. The Hindustan Times reports that Suryakant Dhasmana, senior vice-president of the state Congress committee and AICC member, on Thursday said over 6,500 objections had been filed by just five individuals in Udham Singh Nagar.The publication also reports that Manoj Rawat, former Congress MLA, as pointing out “grave misuse of Form 7” and highlighting the case of an objection was filed against party MLA Furkan Ahmed by a person with the same name, who has denied having filed the objection.The Indian Express had earlier reported that the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) attributed the concentration principally to population movement and migration. Meanwhile the Congress party questioned the pattern behind the deletions.Election officials said that Form 7 figures can vary depending on how actively electoral rolls are scrutinised. Yet, said the CEO’s office, the SIR process was being conducted “in accordance with the rules and in a transparent manner”.For our full coverage on the SIR and the issues it has brought to citizens, click here.