P. Chidambaram, a veteran Congress figure and former cabinet minister, raised questions about the Election Commission of India's conduct of the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls, directing his concerns at Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and calling for answers over what he described as expenditure being incurred twice.

In a post on X, Chidambaram noted that the ECI had called off the SIR exercise for the remaining 17 states and Union Territories, a move he attributed to public opposition and a notice issued by the Supreme Court. Following protests and a Supreme Court notice, the Election Commission of India and its chief Gyanesh Kumar moved to instruct the relevant states and union territories to carry out a Special Summary Revision in place of the earlier process.

For the 17 remaining states and Union Territories, the electoral roll process will follow the standard SSR — the Special Summary Revision — with the intensive revision exercise set aside.

In a social media post, Chidambaram stated that people are not required to present any documents as proof of citizenship. The Congress party official raised questions about why certain states were subjected to SIR while others underwent SSR instead. He further put forward the claim that voter rolls across multiple states had seen names struck off without the procedural safeguards ordinarily required, asking why 20 states had been treated differently under the SIR.

Allegations have surfaced that approximately 133 million voter registrations — encompassing deceased individuals — were purged from rolls without any formal legal process being followed. Chidambaram contended that the Election Commission of India, having already overseen the removal of a large number of names from voter rolls in a manner he described as unauthorised, was now conducting a fresh drive to register those who had been left off the lists.

Aiming his remarks at the Chief Election Commissioner personally, Chidambaram put forward the position that Gyanesh Kumar should bear financial liability for the additional expenditure incurred by running the process twice, with the Congress leader calling for a surcharge to be levied against him.

Voter eligibility under the updated rolls will hinge on a qualifying date of 1 January 2027, with the Election Commission of India having issued instructions to 17 states and Union Territories to carry out a Special Summary Revision of their electoral registers. The directive covers a total of 17 states and Union Territories — among them Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Gujarat, Kerala, Lakshadweep, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Puducherry, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal.

Authorities are carrying out the process under Section 21 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, with the aim of refreshing voter rolls and bringing newly eligible citizens onto the register. Under the timetable set out by the ECI, polling stations are to be consolidated by 2 November, with draft electoral rolls due for release a fortnight later on 12 November.

Claims and objections may be lodged through 11 December, after which the submitted materials are scheduled for processing no later than 28 December. Publication of the definitive voter rolls is scheduled for 4 January 2027.

Timelines for states and Union Territories where the Special Intensive Revision process is still under way or has only recently wrapped up will be notified through a separate announcement, the Election Commission of India has indicated. Among the states and territories falling under this provision are Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha, Telangana, and Delhi. Timelines for Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh — three regions where the exercise has not yet got under way — are to be announced separately, with local weather patterns guiding when those dates are set.