Karnataka received 23,770 additional Form-7 applications seeking deletion of names from electoral rolls between September 24 and October 1, after the claims and objections period for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) had ended, data from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer show.
The number of Form-7 applications rose from 61,130 received between June 16, when the rolls were frozen for the SIR, and September 23, to 84,990 as of October 1 — an increase of about 40%. The CEO’s office, however, said in a press release on Friday that 84,900 Form-7 applications had been received and that the number of forms objecting to proposed inclusions was nil.
The increase comes a day after Karnataka Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar and Cabinet colleagues staged a more than five-hour protest at the Karnataka CEO’s office. Following the protest, the Chief Electoral Officer ordered legal action over false claims in bulk Form-7 applications filed across the State, according to the report.
Form-7 is used to seek deletion of a name from the electoral roll. In Bhalki, Babaleshwar, Belagavi North, Kodagu and several other constituencies, pre-filled applications were filed in bulk, mostly targeting Muslim voters, the report said. The Hindu had earlier reported that bulk filing continued after the objections period in constituencies including Bhalki in Bidar district.
The statutory Form-10 report showed that Bhalki received 1,131 applications between September 24 and September 29, of which 1,123 were bulk filings. Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer V. Anbu Kumar, when asked about the figures, said they were based on the dashboard data.
The post-deadline applications will be considered only after the SIR process. Applications filed up to September 23 will be considered for the final electoral rolls, which are scheduled to be published on October 27. The distinction means that the timing of an application will determine when it enters the electoral-roll review process.
District-level figures show that the increase was not limited to one constituency. In Kodagu, the number of Form-7 applications rose from 696 up to September 23 to 1,143 by October 1. In Shivamogga, the figure increased from 3,685 to 5,760 over the same period.
The scale of the revision has also created a substantial administrative workload. Of the 43,82,306 notices issued during the SIR, 39,169 remained undelivered, while hearings had been completed in 35,60,833 cases. More than 7.82 lakh hearings were still pending, and the CEO’s office said the final hearing would be conducted on October 12.
The Karnataka CEO’s office is expected to complete the remaining hearings before the final electoral rolls are published on October 27. Applications received after the claims and objections period will be taken up only after the SIR process, according to the information reported by The Hindu.
