Five weeks have now elapsed since the Supreme Court delivered its landmark judgment on the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls on May 27, 2026.One of the clearest directions given by the Supreme Court was that the Election Commission (EC) could not simply delete the names of the persons whom it believed were not Indian citizens; instead it was required to refer such cases to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955, for a formal determination of citizenship. The court stated in unmistakable terms:“Regarding persons whose names have been deleted from the 2003 roll on account of the Commission being of the opinion that they are not citizens, the commission shall refer such cases within four weeks to the Competent Authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955, for adjudication of their citizenship.” (Supreme Court judgment dated May 27, 2026, page 123)This was not an optional observation. It was a binding judicial direction. The four-week period prescribed by the Supreme Court has already expired.The obvious question therefore is: Where is the list of the suspected foreigners?Also read: 23 Opposition Parties Including DMK and AAP Write Joint Letter to CJI on SIRThe EC has repeatedly justified the SIR exercise as being necessary to detect non-citizens and protect the integrity of India’s electoral rolls. Throughout the litigation, the existence of suspected foreign nationals was presented as one of the principal constitutional justifications for conducting such an extraordinary nationwide exercise. Yet, when the final SIR results were published in most states, a striking pattern emerged.Post SIR of electoral rolls in 12 states and Union Territories covered under the second phase of SIR, and Bihar in the first phase, the ECI has come up with only categories of the ASDD (Absent, Shifted, Dead and Duplicate). No separate public lists identifying “suspected foreigners” or even the “others” category were released for public scrutiny in those states.The websites of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of respective states displayed only ASDD lists for verification by political parties and citizens. The ECI has carefully side lined every question in the press conferences seeking the details of suspected foreign nationals discovered during the SIR process. In fact, the SIR guidelines also instruct the Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) to refer the suspected cases to the competent authority. But none of the CEOs of the states where SIR is completed have answered how many persons, in each district, have the EROs referred to competent authority as suspected foreigners. In states like Karnataka, the officers were under the impression that the appellate authority for voter verification under the SIR themselves are competent authority for the citizenship questions criss crossing votership verification. This structural anarchy raises a series of unavoidable questions.If the SIR actually identified persons whose citizenship was doubtful:Where are their names?How many such persons were identified in each state?Have their cases been referred to the competent authorities as mandated by the Supreme Court?If so, where is the public record of such referrals?And the most important question is how would they cull out suspected foreigners from the list of ASDD in the 13 states and Union Territories where a separate column of suspected foreign nationals did not exist? What parameters would they use? Will it be unconstitutional and discriminatory?Hence, if for all these reasons, no such referrals have been made despite the expiry of the four-week deadline, the EC owes the country an explanation for its failure to comply with a direct order of the Supreme Court.Also read: How SIR Is Democracy’s Kill Switch: R Rajagopal’s Passport StoryThe issue becomes even more significant because, immediately after the judgment, reports quoting an EC officials stated that the commission would forward the names of deleted electors falling in the “others” category and those treated as suspected foreign nationals to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, in compliance with the court’s direction.If that assurance has been fulfilled, the commission should publish:Number of suspected foreigners identified state-wise;Number of references made to the competent authorities;Authorities to whom those references were sent; andPresent status of those proceedings.If, on the other hand, no such exercise has been undertaken, the silence becomes not only difficult to reconcile with the EC’s own justification for the SIR, but also something for which the EC should be made answerable and accountable to the nation.The question is equally relevant for the Union government.The BJP has consistently portrayed illegal immigration as one of India’s gravest national security challenges. If that is indeed the case, then why after the SIR in Bihar and West Bengal and other states and Union Territories are already over and apparent illegal immigrants already flagged, has the Union government remained silent after the expiry of the Supreme Court’s deadline? Why did the Ministry of Home Affairs not demand disclosure of the alleged suspected foreigners identified through the SIR?The country wants to know Mr. PM: Where are the names of the suspected foreigners?Shivasundar is a columnist and activist in Karnataka.