Lucknow: The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court has dismissed a public interest litigation seeking implementation of a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the upcoming three tier panchayat elections in Uttar Pradesh, terming the petition devoid of merit.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Arun Bhansali and Justice Jaspreet Singh passed the order on a petition filed by Narendra Kumar Tripathi of Sant Kabir Nagar. The court observed that there was no substantial reason to interfere in the process adopted by the State Election Commission.
The bench noted that the SIR process had already begun on July 18, 2025, and the provisional voter list is scheduled to be published on December 23, 2025. It held that merely seeking application of guidelines issued for Lok Sabha and Assembly elections to panchayat polls did not justify judicial intervention. With these observations, the court dismissed the petition as baseless.
Meanwhile, the voter revision exercise for panchayat elections has resulted in a significant increase in the electorate. A total of 1,81,96,367 new voters were added during the revision drive, while 1,41,76,809 names were removed.
State Election Commissioner R P Singh said that compared to the previous voter list, the net increase stood at 40,19,558 voters, amounting to a rise of 3.26 percent. Before the revision, the panchayat voter list had 12,29,50,052 voters, which has now increased to 12,69,69,610.
He said that the deleted names included deceased, displaced and duplicate voters. Among these, duplicate entries were the highest at 53,67,410. According to official data, around 1.05 lakh voters in the 18 to 23 age group were added as first time voters.
The State Election Commissioner said priority was given to adding new eligible voters during the revision process, while ensuring that no ineligible voter remained on the list. The highest increase in voters was recorded in the Terai districts of the state.
