AAP’s Kejriwal SIR ‘Drama’ Exposed? EC Says 33.1 Lakh Got Notices, Including CM Rekha Gupta

New Delhi: A political row erupted in Delhi after the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) claimed that the name of former Chief Minister and party convenor Arvind Kejriwal and his family members had gone missing from the Delhi voter list. However, the Election Commission has clarified that Kejriwal has not been removed from the electoral roll and has instead been issued a notice as part of the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

The Election Commission's clarification came after the AAP questioned how the name of the three-time former Delhi Chief Minister and his family could be absent from the voter list. The poll body said Kejriwal and his family members were among electors who could not be mapped to the electoral roll of the previous SIR exercise and were therefore issued notices for verification.

CM Rekha Gupta, Bansuri Swaraj, Sachdeva Among 33.1 Lakh Electors Flagged

Importantly, Kejriwal is not the only prominent political figure to have received such a notice. According to election officials, around 33.1 lakh electors in Delhi have been identified for notices during the ongoing SIR process. These include current Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta, BJP leader and former Delhi BJP chief Virendra Kumar Sachdeva and BJP MP Bansuri Swaraj, among others.

The Delhi Election Office said more than 31.6 lakh notices had been generated and were being delivered to electors. The notices are intended to allow voters to provide documents and clarify their eligibility.

Rekha Gupta Also Got Notice, Details Verified

Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta was also among the electors flagged during the exercise. Her case was related to an apparent discrepancy in the age details provided for her and her parents.

However, officials said Gupta subsequently submitted the required documents and her details were verified. The Electoral Registration Officer for Shalimar Bagh said her entry had been validated and would be included in the final electoral roll.

The development comes as the Election Commission carries out a detailed revision of Delhi's electoral rolls. Officials have said the notices are part of the verification process and do not, by themselves, mean that an elector has been finally declared ineligible.

What Happened In Kejriwal's Case?

According to the Electoral Registration Officer of the New Delhi Assembly constituency, the enumeration forms submitted by Kejriwal and his family did not contain complete details that would have enabled them to be linked with the electoral roll of the previous revision in their respective states.

Besides Arvind Kejriwal, notices were also issued to his wife Sunita Kejriwal, his parents Gobind Ram Kejriwal and Gita Devi, and his son Pulkit. The family members had been voters in the New Delhi constituency.

The Election Commission has categorised notices into two broad groups - electors who could not be mapped to the previous SIR roll and those whose details were mapped but contained logical discrepancies, such as differences in names or dates of birth.

AAP Targets EC, BJP Over Notices

The notice issued to Kejriwal triggered a sharp response from the AAP. The party questioned how the former Delhi Chief Minister and his family could be shown as missing from the voter list and alleged that the SIR process was being used for political purposes.

AAP national media in-charge Anurag Dhanda accused the BJP of attempting to delete the votes of political opponents and questioned the Election Commission over the status of Kejriwal's name.

The Election Commission, however, clarified that the claim that Kejriwal's name had simply "vanished" from the voter list was misleading. An EC official said the names were on the relevant list and that notices had been issued because the electors had not mapped themselves to the previous SIR roll. Their eligibility can be established during the claims and verification process.

33.1 Lakh Electors Flagged

The wider numbers put the Kejriwal controversy in perspective. Of the approximately 33.1 lakh electors marked for notices, around 13.79 lakh could not be linked to the electoral roll of the previous intensive revision, while about 19.33 lakh were flagged for logical discrepancies in their enumeration forms.

The draft electoral roll published on August 31 contained around 97.5 lakh electors, after approximately 47.5 lakh names were excluded from the draft list for reasons including voters being untraceable, having shifted, being deceased or having duplicate entries. Eligible voters have the opportunity to seek inclusion or raise objections during the prescribed process.

The final electoral roll is scheduled to be published on November 4, 2026.

Thus, while the AAP has turned Kejriwal's notice into a political flashpoint, the Election Commission's response is that the former Delhi Chief Minister is one among millions of electors undergoing verification and that receiving a notice does not amount to a final deletion from the electoral roll.

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