A day after the Election Commission announced a special intensive revision of the electoral rolls in 12 states and Union Territories, Opposition parties on Tuesday described the move as an “attempt to undermine democracy”.

The parties alleged that the exercise was aimed at disenfranchising voters as several states head to polls in 2026.

The revision of the electoral rolls will cover Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Goa, Puducherry, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Lakshadweep, Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar said on Monday.

Of the 12 states and Union Territories, Assembly elections are scheduled for Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Kerala and Puducherry in 2026.

After the Election Commission’s announcement, the Congress alleged that the poll panel will now “play the game of vote theft in 12 states”.

“Under the guise of [special intensive revision], 6.9 million votes were slashed in Bihar,” the party said in a social media post. “Now tens of millions of votes will be slashed in 12 states. This is blatant vote theft that [Prime Minister] Narendra Modi and the Election Commission are carrying out together.”

The Congress added: “When [special intensive revision] happened in Bihar, the Election Commission’s theft was exposed before the country. Even the Supreme Court has reprimanded the Commission over this.”

In Bihar, where the revision was completed ahead of the Assembly elections in November, at least 47 lakh voters were excluded from the final electoral roll published on September 30.

Concerns had been raised after the announcement in Bihar that the exercise could remove eligible voters from the roll. Several petitioners also moved the Supreme Court against it. On September 8, the court directed the Election Commission to accept Aadhaar as valid identity proof for the exercise in Bihar.

Aadhaar had not been among the 11 documents the poll panel had allowed as proof of citizenship. Petitioners had called its exclusion “absurd”, noting that it was the most widely held form of identification.

On Tuesday, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also described the Election Commission’s decision to conduct the revision in his state as “an affront to our democratic process”.

“Basing this on outdated lists and rushing it ahead of local elections raises serious concerns,” he said in a social media post. “Kerala firmly opposes this attempt to undermine democracy and calls for united resistance to defend it.”

In September, the Kerala Assembly had unanimously passed a resolution against the poll panel’s decision to conduct the revision of the state’s electoral rolls, saying that the “hasty” move could harm the rights of citizens.

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin alleged that the poll panel’s announcement on Monday was politically motivated.

“To conduct SIR in a hasty and opaque manner is nothing but a conspiracy by the Election Commission to rob citizens of their rights and help the BJP,” Stalin said on social media. “In Bihar, large numbers of women, minorities and people from Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities were removed from the electoral rolls.”

Communist Party of India General Secretary D Raja said the Election Commission must ensure a level playing field, The Hindu reported.

“The EC is a constitutional body mandated to ensure that every legitimate citizen gets to exercise his right to vote,” Raja told The Hindu. “What happened in Bihar is a lesson not only to political parties but also to the EC.”

National Conference leader and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah urged the poll panel to hold off the revision in other states until the Bihar elections are completed, the newspaper reported.

“It is not clear yet whether there will be any benefits from this exercise,” Abdullah was quoted as saying. “Let the elections in Bihar be completed, then we will see whether it was beneficial at all. Then we can talk about implementing it in the rest of the country”

The Election Commission has repeatedly defended the revision as a clean-up effort to remove names of the deceased, duplicate entries and undocumented migrants.

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