Bengaluru: The Election Commission has issued 43.81 lakh notices to voters over unmapped records and discrepancies identified during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Karnataka, but only 7.31 lakh of them have so far been delivered.

Of the 43,81,143 notices generated, 7,31,770 (16.7%) have been delivered to voters, while 36,49,373 are still pending delivery.

The notices include 23.45 lakh cases involving voters whose details could not be mapped with the 2002 electoral roll data and 20.35 lakh cases involving anomalies such as mismatches in names or ages.

The scale of the exercise has put a significant workload on election officials. The Election Commission has appointed 224 Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and 4,262 Assistant EROs and additional AEROs to conduct hearings, which will continue until October 12.

However, only 206 hearings were completed on the first day on September 3. Officials will need to dispose of an average of around 1.4 lakh notices every day over the next 30 days to complete the process involving all 43.81 lakh notices.

Chief Electoral Officer V Anbukkumar said all 206 claims heard on the first day were accepted.

“The number of hearings will increase as the days progress. We intend to conduct the hearings closer to the voter – at panchayat offices or polling booths,” he said.

Voters will have to appear in person for the hearing and produce the documents specified in their notices. Those unable to attend a scheduled hearing will be given one opportunity to reschedule.

The CEO’s office will issue weekly updates on the number of notices disposed of, Anbukkumar said.

The office has also informed registered and recognised political parties that the list of voters who have been issued notices will be shared with them before September 6. This will enable political parties to assist voters in attending the hearings and producing the required documents.

Following the rationalisation of polling stations, the Election Commission has appointed 1,873 additional Booth Level Officers (BLOs) and created their logins on the BLO App. The BLOs will cover all 60,923 polling booths in the state.

For voters facing a no-mapping issue, Aadhaar and up to two other documents from the 11 documents approved by the Election Commission may be submitted if the voter does not have the 2002 SIR data available for mapping either their own details or those of their progeny.

1.07 crore voters excluded from draft roll

The draft electoral roll published on August 24 contains 4.46 crore voters — 2,21,60,327 men, 2,24,74,926 women and 2,871 third-gender voters.

Another 1.07 crore names marked under the categories of absent, shifted, dead, duplicate and others (ASDDO) were excluded from the draft roll.

Special campaign on September 19-20

The Election Commission will hold a second special campaign for voter enrolment on September 19 and 20.

New voters and those whose names were excluded from the draft electoral roll can submit Form 6 either online or offline during the claims and objections period.

The claims and objections period runs from August 24 to September 23. Names of eligible voters who submit Form 6 during this period will be included in the final electoral roll, subject to verification by the EROs. The final rolls are scheduled to be published on October 27.

However, Form 6 can also be submitted throughout the year.

Since June 16, the Election Commission has received 15.17 lakh applications under various forms. These include 5,34,298 Form 6 applications for voter inclusion, 4,016 Form 6A applications for NRI voter inclusion, 32,781 Form 7 applications seeking deletion of names and 9,45,968 Form 8 applications for corrections.