EC team reviews preparations for Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar

Patna: An Election Commission of India (ECI) team on Thursday held a meeting with Bihar Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) and other officials to review preparations for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the state ahead of the assembly polls due later this year.

The ECI team is led by Senior Deputy Election Commissioner (Sr DEC) Maneesh Garg.

A statement issued by the office of the Bihar CEO said, "The ECI team headed by Sr DEC held a review meeting with officers of the Bihar CEO on Thursday.

Addressing the meeting, Garg said that the SIR is to be done in Bihar in view of the upcoming Vidhan Sabha General Election 2025." The ECI guidelines were explained to all the officials present in the meeting through power point presentation. Various issues related to the process were discussed to ensure that the SIR could be completed within the time limit, it said.

The upcoming Bihar Legislative Assembly General Election 2025 is the first state in the country to start SIR. Further, this special intensive revision will also be done in other states. During the SIR exercise, the electors will have to fill the enumeration form through BLO or through online process.

Later in the day, the ECI team held a meeting with all Divisional Commissioners (DCs) and District Magistrates for the successful implementation of SIR. The meeting continued till late Thursday evening.

"In the meeting with DCs and DMs, the ECI team explained all instructions/guidelines, procedures and goals related to the SIR to the officials.

"Officials were also informed about important aspects related to distribution and collection of electoral forms from house to house, reorganization of polling stations, effective use of digital platforms, prioritizing socially disadvantaged groups and running public awareness campaigns with the help of political parties and media," said the statement.

During the meeting, officials were also briefed about the ECINET app, a unified digital platform launched by the ECI to streamline electoral processes and enhance transparency and accessibility.

"Volunteers can be deployed by the District Election Officer for timely and smooth operation of revision work. In view of the upcoming assembly election 2025, polling stations are also to be reorganised based on the standard of 1,200 voters per centre. In this process, it will be ensured that members of the same family are registered at the same polling station and voters do not have to travel more than two km to vote," said the statement.