A united Opposition, led by the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, staged a fierce protest in the Parliament House complex on Friday against the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar, calling it an ‘attack on democracy’.
Top leaders, including Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, MPs Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Gaurav Gogoi, Manish Tewari, Hibi Eden, and Samajwadi Party MP Dharmendra Yadav, were among the protesting leaders. The leaders held a large banner in Hindi branding SIR as an effort to ‘suppress voting rights’. They gathered at Makar Dwar, the Parliament’s entrance gate, and accused the ECI of manipulating voter rolls in the election-bound state to deny citizens their right to vote.
As part of their symbolic protest, the MPs tore red placards with ‘SIR’ written on them and dumped them into a makeshift dustbin, marking their rejection of the revision process. Slogans like ‘Vote-bandi bandh karo’ (Stop vote-ban) and ‘Loktantra bachao’ (Save democracy) echoed through the protest site.
Priyanka Gandhi slammed the lack of transparency, stating, “It’s supposed to be a transparent democracy. Why is the government not providing the information we’re seeking?” Congress MP Manish Tewari questioned the legality of creating a new electoral roll altogether, claiming it invalidated the one used in the Lok Sabha elections. “Which law permits such a revision by the ECI?” he asked.
Samajwadi Party MP Dharmendra Yadav vowed to continue the resistance: “We will fight such a battle inside and outside Parliament that the government will be forced to withdraw this decision.”
TMC MP Sagarika Ghose expressed concern over the disenfranchisement of vulnerable groups. “The way SIR is being implemented is depriving thousands—especially daily wage workers and migrant labourers—of their right to vote,” she said.
Congress MP Hibi Eden stressed that the protest wasn’t limited to his party alone. “This is a united Opposition stand on a critical issue. We demand a serious reconsideration and rollback of SIR,” he said.
Meanwhile, the ECI claimed that 99% of the nearly 7.89 crore electors in Bihar had been covered under the ongoing SIR process. It reported that 21.6 lakh electors were deceased, 31.5 lakh had permanently migrated, seven lakh were enrolled in multiple locations, and one lakh were untraceable.
Despite ECI’s defence, the Opposition remains firm, warning of intensified protests unless the revision exercise is rolled back.
