After SIR axe, voter count shrinks by 37 lakh in 152 constituencies that will go to polls in first phase
Times of India | 12 April 2026
Kolkata: The voter count in the 152 assembly constituencies that will go to polls in the first phase is 37 lakh less than the pre-SIR voter list.
In the 16 districts that go to the polls on April 23 — Cooch Behar, Alipurduar, Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling, Kalimpong, North Dinajpur, South Dinajpur, Malda, Murshidabad, Birbhum, Bankura, Purulia, Jhargram, East Midnapore, West Midnapore and West Burdwan — the new voters' count is 3,60,77,171, a significant 9.4% less than 3,98,14,801 prior to the SIR exercise.
Altogether, 24,03,881 names were deleted on account of ASDD (absent, shifted, dead or duplicate) voters in the draft list published on Dec 16. Thereafter, 14,28,771 elector names were deleted in the judicial adjudication process. In addition, a few thousand names were deleted in the final list published on Feb 28.
"The number of electors in these 152 assembly constituencies went down by 24 lakh in the draft roll. During the hearing process, again, a few thousand names were deleted. Then, 14 lakh names marked "under adjudication" were deleted by the judicial officers. However, after considering the Form- 6 additions, the final voters' count is now over 3.6 crore," a senior EC official said.
According to official figures, the total number of voters in phase 1 stood at 3,60,77,171, including 1,84,99,496 male, 1,75,77,210 female, and 465 third gender electors.
Among the districts, Murshidabad has lost the highest number of electors at over 7 lakh, followed by Malda with the loss of over 4 lakh voters and North Dinajpur and West Burdwan that have both lost around with 3.5 lakh voters.
Even post-SIR, Murshidabad has the highest number of electors at 50,26,213, followed by East Midnapore with 41,60,154 voters and West Midnapore with 37,70,794. Kalimpong has the lowest electorate at 2,01,619.
North Bengal districts together accounted for a significant share of voters. Cooch Behar leads the region with 22,63,771 electors, while Jalpaiguri and Darjeeling reported 17,19,798 and 11,10,425 voters, respectively. Alipurduar has 11,64,506 electors.
In south Bengal, districts including Bankura (29,19,415), Birbhum (26,91,386), and Purulia (22,52,807) contribute substantially to the electoral pool.
With the rolls frozen, no further additions or deletions were permitted, locking in the electorate base for the first phase. This raised a question on what will happen to voters whose applications may be "approved" by the tribunal. The SC is expected to hear the matter on Monday.