An 83-Lakh Deficit: Bihar's Population Is Growing, So Why Has its Electorate Shrunk After the SIR?
The stated motto of the Election Commission of India (ECI) is: “no eligible voter to be left out, and no ineligible person to be included in the Electoral rolls.” The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in poll-bound Bihar was meant to be the fulfilment of this promise.
However, an analysis of the ECI's own final numbers, when measured against the government's official population projections, reveals not a purified list, but a shrunken one that leaves Bihar with a democratic deficit of 83 lakh people on the eve of a crucial election.
The purpose of any electoral roll revision, including the recent SIR in Bihar, is to move the list of registered voters closer to the reality of the state's eligible adult population. The ideal is a 100% Elector-Population (EP) ratio, where every adult citizen is registered to vote.
The state of the electorate before the SIR
To assess the impact of the SIR, one must first understand the baseline situation.
What was the universe of eligible voters in Bihar? A universe is a collection that contains all the entities one wishes to consider in a given situation.
According to the 'Report of the Technical Group on Population Projections,' an official government source, Bihar’s population of citizens aged 18 and above was projected to be 8.18 crore in July 2025. This figure represents the ideal number of electors the roll should contain.
However, the actual electorate, on June 24, 2025, the day the SIR began, had 7.89 crore names. This data indicates that even before the SIR started, there was a gap of approximately 29 lakh between the number of eligible adults in the state and the number of registered voters. A primary objective of an intensive revision would presumably be to identify and close this gap.
Expected growth versus actual outcome
A state's eligible population is not static. The same government report projects that 27.50 lakh people in Bihar would turn 18 over the course of 2025. By October 1, 2025, when the final roll was published, an estimated 20.62 lakh of them would have become eligible to vote during the year.
Therefore, a revision that successfully enrolled new voters and closed the pre-existing gap would be expected to result in an electoral roll larger than the starting figure of 7.89 crore.
However, the final data from the SIR shows the opposite trend. The final electoral roll, published on September 30, 2025, contains 7.42 crore electors. Instead of growing, the electorate has seen a net reduction of 47 lakh names from its size on June 24. This is a significant statistical event, as it marks a reversal of the consistent growth seen in Bihar’s voter rolls over the last decade.
Calculating the democratic deficit
The "democratic deficit" can be understood as the total number of eligible citizens in the state who are not on the final electoral roll.
Ideally, the total pool of eligible adults by October 1, 2025, would be the 8.18 crore from July, plus those who turned 18 between July and October (approximately 7 lakh). This places the ideal target at around 8.25 crore. However the actual electorate as of this date, according to the final list, stands at 7.42 crore.
The difference between the ideal number of eligible voters and the actual number on the final list is approximately 83 lakh. This deficit appears to be composed of the pre-existing gap of unregistered citizens, the majority of the newly eligible young voters from 2025 who were not added, and a significant number of previously registered voters whose names were removed during the revision process.
So, based on a comparison of the ECI's final figures with the government's own population projections, the SIR exercise concluded with a voter roll that is numerically smaller than when it began and further away from the state's total eligible adult population. This outcome raises questions regarding the SIR's effectiveness in achieving its stated goal of ensuring no eligible voter is left out.
As the election process comes under scrutiny, read The Wire's coverage of the Bihar SIR, opposition's allegations and more, here
This article went live on October first, two thousand twenty five, at nineteen minutes past four in the afternoon.The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
