Preliminary exercise to map current electors against 2005 voters’ list
By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Oct 7: The Election Commission of India (ECI) will soon announce the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) across the country, including Meghalaya.
Chief Electoral Officer BDR Tiwari, on Tuesday, highlighted various activities and programmes of the ECI and preparations for the pre-activities of the upcoming SIR.
He said all CEOs have been asked to conduct a preliminary exercise to map the current electors of 2025 against the voters’ list published after the last intensive revision held in 2005. The electoral roll after the last intensive revision in Meghalaya was published on April 15, 2005, with January 1, 2005, as the qualifying date.
A comparison of the two electoral rolls reveals that in 2005, there were 13,35,816 electors in the state. This increased to 23,06,384 during the intensive revision in September 2025.
The number of male electors increased from 6,64,306 in 2005 to 11,37,316, and that of female voters from 6,71,510 in 2005 to 11,69,062 now. The September 2025 roll has six third-gender electors.
Tiwari stated that four categories of electors have been mapped, according to the SIR.
Category A includes electors whose names are registered in the 2005 voter list and are required to upload or submit only the relevant part of the extract of the 2005 voters’ list along with the enumeration form.
Category B includes electors not in the 2005 list who were born in India before July 1, 1987. They are required to upload or submit self-documents along with the enumeration form.
Category C includes electors who were born between July 1, 1987, and December 2, 2004, and whose mother’s or father’s name is not registered in the 2005 voters’ list. They are required to upload or submit a self-document and a document of either the mother or the father.
Category D includes electors who were born after December 2, 2004, and whose mother’s and father’s names are not registered in the 2005 voters’ list. They are required to submit or upload a self-document, mother’s document, and father’s document.
The CEO also stated that, in pursuance of the Supreme Court’s September 8 order, the Aadhaar card shall be treated as the 12th document. The June 24 SIR order listed 11 documents in Annexure C and Annexure D.
The Aadhaar card is to be accepted and utilised as proof of identity, not as proof of citizenship, in keeping with Section 9 of the Aadhaar (Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits, and Services) Act, 2016.
Polling stations with more than 1,200 electors each have been asked to be rationalised to ease the voting process. In Meghalaya, there are 27 such polling stations.
Apart from these 27, the ECI has approved 49 new polling stations with fewer voters due to the hilly terrain, topography, motorable distance, and convenience of the electors.
Twelve polling stations were removed due to the merging of male/female polling stations into general polling stations after rationalisation. The total number of polling stations after rationalisation stands at 3,615 with a net increase of 64 polling stations.
The ECI further approved 35 new Assistant Electoral Registration Officers, including five replacements. The total number of AEROs for Meghalaya’s 60 Assembly constituencies stands at 126.
