Hyderabad: AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi has strongly criticised the central government over its electoral policies, claiming that the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls will be used to create a permanent class of excluded Indian citizens.
The Hyderabad Member of Parliament alleged that nearly sixty-five million names have already been deleted from the electoral rolls under the SIR exercise across thirteen states and union territories. Taking to the social media platform X, Owaisi condemned the government’s proposal to form a committee tasked with studying these exclusions to build a permanent framework for identifying, detaining, and deporting illegal immigrants.
The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief argued that the administration first executed a document-driven revision to purge millions of voters and now intends to use those very exclusions to establish a system of deportation. He emphasised that the right to vote remains the only weapon the poor possess against the powerful, warning that without it, the government would act entirely at its own whim. He further noted that reports are already emerging of individuals being denied vital benefits from various government welfare schemes due to these deletions.
Owaisi pointed out that, under the law, a deletion under the SIR mechanism does not automatically imply that a person is not a citizen. He highlighted that twenty-seven lakh individuals remain under adjudication, and many may still apply afresh for voter enrolment using Form 6. Furthermore, he noted that the Election Commission of India has provided no definitive data on how many people were excluded specifically for being foreign nationals, adding that available data suggests the majority of those affected are Muslims, women, the poor, and migrant workers.
Questioning the necessity of the proposed committee, Owaisi cited the government’s own demographic data showing that the national population has stabilised with a total fertility rate of 2.0. He alleged that the true purpose of the committee is to foster constant paranoia and fear directed against the Muslim community. The MP concluded by accusing the government of forcing ordinary Indians to waste their time on endless documentation, whether through KYC checks, electoral revisions, or digital portal uploads, while simultaneously failing to conduct simple public examinations properly and shielding itself from public scrutiny.
(Inputs from IANS)