Days after Alt Information broke via the Election Fee of India’s boundaries to entry Particular Intensive Revision knowledge — revealing that in Bhabanipur and Ballygunge a Muslim voter was 3.1 instances extra prone to be marked “Beneath Adjudication” than a Hindu voter — we prolonged the identical train to 4 extra constituencies.
We digitised and analysed rolls from Manikchak and Mothabari in Maldah district, and Samserganj and Baharampur in Murshidabad district.
What we discovered there was much more startling.
In Manikchak, the place Hindus and Muslim voters are nearly precisely equal in quantity, 97.4% of all voters positioned Beneath Adjudication are Muslim.
Mothabari: 69.5% Muslim voters. 97.4% of ‘Beneath Adjudication’ voters are Muslim.
Samserganj: 82% Muslim voters. 98.8% of ‘Beneath Adjudication’ voters are Muslim.
Baharampur: 26.9% Muslim voters. 61.6% of ‘Beneath Adjudication’ voters are Muslims.
Throughout all six constituencies mixed, Alt Information has now digitised 12,81,764 voter data. Of the three,02,573 voters positioned Beneath Adjudication throughout these constituencies, 92.6% are Muslim in a mixed citizens the place Muslims make up 51.7% of voters. The general Muslim adjudication charge is 42.2%, i.e, out of each 100 Muslim voters, greater than 42 have been positioned below adjudication. The Hindu adjudication charge is 3.5%. The mixed ratio is roughly 12:1.
The ‘Beneath Adjudication’ or ‘Logical Discrepancy’ class was launched for the primary time in Indian electoral historical past in the course of the West Bengal SIR 2026. It’s described by the Election Fee as a software program flag triggered by inconsistencies in voter data — title spellings, father’s title variations, transliteration variations. The algorithm that produces these flags was described as being utilized uniformly throughout communities. The query the info is asking is that this: if the standards have been utilized uniformly, what produced a near-total focus of adjudicated voters from one group in constituencies the place that group doesn’t have something near a near-total majority?
Samserganj (56)
Samserganj has 235,592 voters. Muslims are 82% of its citizens, which is 193,129 individuals.
Whole variety of voters positioned below adjudication on this constituency is 107,663. Of these, 106,407, or a whopping 98.8% are Muslims.
In different phrases, 55.1% of all Muslim voters within the constituency have been positioned below adjudication. For Hindu voters, this determine is 2.3%.
The general adjudication charge in Samserganj is 45.7% of all the citizens, which is the very best of all six constituencies Alt Information has examined.
Mothabari (52)
Mothabari has 2,03,660 voters. Muslims are 69.5% of its citizens, which is 141,592 individuals.
Whole variety of voters positioned below adjudication on this constituency is 78,797. Of these, 76,781, or a whopping 97.4% are Muslims.
In different phrases, 54.2% of all Muslim voters within the constituency have been positioned below adjudication. For Hindu voters, this determine is 3%.
The general adjudication charge in Mothabari is 38.7% of all the citizens.
Manikchak (49)
Manikchak is, of all six constituencies examined, the one the place the arithmetic is most troublesome to elucidate. It has 2,54,729 voters. Hindus are 50.2% of the citizens — 1,27,820 voters. Muslims are 49.4% — 1,25,941 voters. It’s, throughout the margin of electoral registration, a constituency cut up precisely down the center.
Of the 65,421 voters positioned Beneath Adjudication in Manikchak, 63,689 are Muslim and 1,524 are Hindu. In a 50-50 constituency, 97.4% of adjudicated voters are from one group.
The Muslim adjudication charge(Muslims positioned below adjudication/Whole Muslim voters) in Manikchak is 50.6%. The Hindu adjudication charge is 1.2%. The ratio is 42.4X. A Muslim voter in Manikchak is 42.4 instances extra prone to be positioned Beneath Adjudication than a Hindu voter in the identical constituency.
Baharampur (72)
Baharampur tells a special story — and that distinction issues for a way the remainder of the info is learn. Baharampur has 2,35,496 voters. Hindus are 72.1% of the citizens. Muslims are 26.9%.
The general adjudication charge is 4.7%. Of adjudicated voters, 61.6% are Muslim and 37.3% are Hindu. The Muslim adjudication charge is 10.8%(Muslims below adjudication/Whole Muslim voters). The Hindu adjudication charge is 2.4%. The ratio is 4.4X.
The disparity in Baharampur nonetheless exists and nonetheless warrants scrutiny. However its scale is dramatically completely different from the three different constituencies examined on this story. Baharampur went via the identical SIR course of, utilizing the identical ERONET software program, with the identical “Logical Discrepancy” standards, revealed on the identical date — February 28, 2026. The query the comparability raises is a simple one: what produced such completely different outcomes in several constituencies below an identical course of situations?
Within the 2021 meeting elections, Trinamool Congress received 5 of the six seats which we’ve got analyzed to date. The one BJP win was Baharampur — additionally the constituency with the bottom adjudication charge in our knowledge at 4.7%.
In Samserganj, Trinamool received by 26,379 votes over Congress. Beneath SIR 2026, 1,07,663 voters are below adjudication.
In Mothabari, Trinamool received by 56,573 votes over BJP. Beneath SIR 2026, 78,797 voters are below adjudication.
In Manikchak, Trinamool received by 33,878 votes over BJP. Beneath SIR 2026, 65,421 voters are below adjudication.
In Baharampur, BJP received by 26,852 votes over AITC. Beneath SIR 2026, 11,088 voters are below adjudication.
In Bhabanipur, Trinamool received by 28,719 votes over BJP. Beneath SIR 2026, 15,618 voters are below adjudication.
In Ballygunge, Trinamool received by 75,359 votes over BJP. Beneath SIR 2026, 23,986 voters are below adjudication.
From Excessive Courtroom Judges to Rural Cubicles: The Attain of SIR’s Arbitrary Flags
Throughout nationwide and regional media and on social media, there are documented instances of individuals whose voting rights have been suspended below the SIR — individuals whose credentials are past query. There are uncountable stories of households the place some members made it onto the rolls and others didn’t, with no clarification offered for the distinction. A small variety of these instances have been reported by title.
Justice Sahidullah Munshi served as a decide of the Calcutta Excessive Courtroom between 2013 and 2020 and at the moment chairs the West Bengal Board of Auqaf. His title was marked “not discovered” within the supplementary checklist. His spouse and sons have been positioned Beneath Adjudication. He had submitted all paperwork together with his passport and had intentionally not recognized himself as a former excessive courtroom decide in the course of the verification listening to, desirous to be handled as an odd citizen. His title was restored within the March 27 supplementary checklist solely after media protection, not via the method working as designed.
Wing Commander (Retd) Md Shamim Akhtar served the Indian Air Pressure for 17 years. His title had been on the electoral rolls since 2002. His title was marked Beneath Adjudication within the March 23 supplementary checklist after which deleted totally on March 28, with none formal listening to, with out discover, and with none clarification. His members of the family’ names stay on the rolls. His Sales space Degree Officer, when contacted, advised him to rent a lawyer and method a tribunal.
Mohtab Sheikh, the Congress candidate from Farakka in Murshidabad, discovered his title positioned Beneath Adjudication within the remaining roll revealed on February 28, stopping him from submitting his nomination papers. He was compelled to method the Supreme Courtroom immediately. A tribunal headed by former Chief Justice of the Calcutta excessive courtroom T S Sivagnanam directed his reinstatement. The tribunal discovered that whereas there was a “knowledge inconsistency” in his father’s particulars, there was no legitimate floor to exclude him from the voter checklist.
These are three documented, named instances. Stories in nationwide and regional media describe many extra — gazetted officers, professionals, aged voters who attended each listening to and submitted each doc and nonetheless discovered their names lacking.
Alt Information on March 29 visited Begumpur-Bibipur panchayat space in Basirhat Uttar meeting constituency within the North 24 Parganas district of Bengal, the place a number of villages have seen Muslim voters struck off the checklist, en masse. In Sales space 5 of Boro Gobra village, names of 340 out of 358 villagers positioned below adjudication have been deleted. All of them Muslims. A number of neighbouring villages have related tales to inform. We witnessed first hand the trauma and sense of helplessness of the individuals, many have lived there all their lives. They’ve voted in successive elections. Some can hint their roots again generations. But, in a single day, they’ve been pushed into an area of doubt, the place their belonging itself appears to require proof. The story could be learn right here.
What the Knowledge is Asking
Alt Information’s method in each investigations has been constant: We publish the info, we report what it reveals, and we ask the questions that any sincere analyst would ask. We don’t declare to know the intent behind what the numbers reveal. The next questions come up immediately from the info and stay unanswered by the Election Fee.
1. The “Logical Discrepancy” flag was triggered by an algorithm utilized to voter data. If the set off standards have been utilized uniformly throughout communities, what produced a 97.4% Muslim share of adjudicated voters in Manikchak, a constituency the place Hindus and Muslims are equal in quantity? What particular transliteration or data-matching rule produces this end result in a 50-50 constituency?
2. The booth-level knowledge from Manikchak reveals near-zero adjudication in sure cubicles, and really excessive adjudication in another cubicles. Is that this the anticipated output of a impartial algorithm? In that case, what characteristic of the underlying knowledge or of the algorithm’s standards would clarify why the “logical discrepancy” charge varies so dramatically by group throughout the identical constituency?
3. In Samserganj, 1,06,407 Muslim voters, which is greater than half the Muslim citizens, have been positioned Beneath Adjudication. Elections are days away. What’s the exact timeline for resolving their standing? Who’s the named official chargeable for making certain they’ll vote? And if they can’t vote on this election, what treatment exists for the denial of a constitutional proper?
4. Wing Commander (Retd) Md Shamim Akhtar served the Indian Air Pressure for 17 years. Justice Sahidullah Munshi served the Calcutta excessive courtroom for seven years. A Congress candidate couldn’t file his nomination papers. If the method couldn’t appropriately deal with these voters with their documentation, their means, their entry to establishments, what does the method seem like for the individuals who have none of these issues?
5. It may fairly be surmised {that a} vital variety of the 27 lakh voters excluded after the ultimate supplementary checklist will finally be reinstated via the appellate tribunals, successfully establishing that their removing was unjustified. Now, can an election held whereas such appeals are nonetheless pending actually be known as free and truthful?
The Knowledge is Open; Confirm it Your self
Alt Information has made all 1,281,764 voter data throughout six constituencies searchable by title and voter ID.
For Bhabanipur and Ballygunge, go to sir-data-decoded.altnews.in.
For Manikchak, Mothabari, Samserganj and Baharampur, go to openrolls.
Each quantity on this story traces again to a selected file within the dataset. Each demographic classification carries a confidence rating. The methodology, how we digitised 1568 PDF information, which instruments we used, what the accuracy limitations are, is all documented.
We name ourselves the world’s largest democracy. Democracy will not be a title that may coexist with the suspension of the proper to vote of those that are least geared up to struggle for it — the aged girl in Bhabanipur with a stamp throughout her voter card, the farmer in Mothabari who attended each listening to and nonetheless discovered his title gone, the households in Manikchak the place some members are on the rolls and others usually are not, and nobody has been advised why.
If the method that produced these numbers can’t be defined by the establishment that designed it, in plain language, with particular solutions, then the query of who’s chargeable for the violation of the proper to vote of lakhs of Indian residents will not be a political query. It’s a constitutional one.
The info is right here. The questions are right here. We’re ready for solutions.
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