Bengaluru, 5 August

The Elections Commission (EC) has updated its website to allow the 1.11 crore voters who have been marked under the Absent, Shifted, Dead, Duplicate/Already Enrolled and Others (ASDDO) category during the ongoing SIR exercise to check if they are marked for deletion. This means that over 20 per cent of Karnataka’s electorate may be deleted, depending on how the claims and objections are processed. 

Electors who have been wrongly classified as ASDDO can have their Enumeration Forms restored through the Booth Level Officers (BLO) or the Electoral Registration Officer until 8 August.

Notably, over 50 lakh of the people categorised as ASDDO during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls are from the four Bengaluru zones. Bengaluru Urban had 18,13,010 such electors (45.09 per cent), BBMP South 11,07,678 (51.65 per cent), BBMP North 11,07,027 (47.46 per cent) and BBMP Central 9,15,035 (48.42 per cent).

Other districts with high ASDDO numbers included Mysuru (5,72,509), Kalaburagi (5,35,403), Belagavi (5,07,983), Raichur (3,21,107), Vijayapura (3,01,264) and Dharwad (2,81,242).

Across the State, 16,30,012 voters are marked as absent or untraceable, 16,30,872 as deceased, 6,89,904 are enrolled elsewhere and 4,88,974 cases listed under other reasons.

The release clarified that electors listed under the ASDDO category have not yet been removed from the electoral rolls.

Chief Electoral Officer V Anbukumar said the State had completed 100 per cent distribution of Enumeration Forms, while digitisation had reached 79.93 per cent as of 2pm on Wednesday, with 22,977 forms pending.

A total of 4.43 crore Enumeration Forms has been digitised, while all 5.54 crore forms, including those related to electors listed under the ASDDO category, have been processed.

Between 16 June and 4 August, authorities received 12,20,312 applications, comprising 3,72,201 Form-6 applications, 3,207 Form-6A applications, 30,952 Form-7 applications and 8,13,952 Form-8 applications. Anbukumar 10 lakh Form-6 applications had been printed and supplied to Electoral Registration Officers to facilitate the enrolment of eligible citizens who would attain 18 years of age on or before 1 October.