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It is usual to greet acquaintances and friends with a question in Kolkata – “Ki hochchhe?” What’s happening? In 2026, the invariable follow up question is, “Is all well? SIR?” In this most extraordinary of elections in India ever, the West Bengal experience is the most bizarre. The head spinning particulars of why that is so can be explained in two ways: first, by a chronological account of what happened when and why and the new set of jargon that was introduced by the EC to deal with it; second, by an account of how real people experienced this Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.

For starters, the expectations was that after Bihar, it was assumed that the teething problems of the beta version of SIR had been removed and the SIR in phase two, in nine states and three Union Territories, would be structured and systematic. That is not how it worked out in West Bengal; in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, things were different and for a good reason.

The Special Intensive Revision and its haphazard implementation, endless brawling and continuous tinkering with the process to get a so-called “infiltrator” excluded is a work in progress in West Bengal. Special to the state is a two parallel-channel structured division of labour to delist and enlist voters. One is operated by the EC, under its usual rules; the other functioning under the orders of the Supreme Court, pertaining to listed voters who are “under adjudication” is being run by the judiciary, with the Calcutta high court in the saddle. This includes the adjudication process itself and the submissions to tribunals, not as yet functional, by adjudicated and deleted voters for inclusion.

In the regular track, run by the EC, under SIR, there were voters marked “unmapped” when the draft list was published. These were about 58 lakh voters whose names were not adequately connected to the benchmark 2002 voters list, when the state underwent a different version of the SIR. Now, there are voters marked “under adjudication” after the final electoral rolls were published on February 28, on account of “logical discrepancies.”

The Supreme Court had observed during the hearing on petitions complaining against the ECI that “in a State the fundamental and constitutional rights to participate in an election is to be........

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