Use SIR route for restore voter names: HC to Hyderabad family

Syed Qutubuddin Masood claimed that his name and those of his family members had been deleted from the electoral roll, preventing them from voting in the 2024 general elections.

Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Tuesday, June 30, declined to intervene in a plea challenging the deletion of a Hyderabad family’s names from the electoral roll, holding that the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise provided a complete statutory mechanism for inclusion and correction, making writ intervention unwarranted at this stage.

A division bench of Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice GM Mohiuddin disposed of a writ petition filed by city resident Syed Qutubuddin Masood, who claimed that his name and those of his family members had been deleted from the electoral roll, preventing them from voting in the 2024 general elections.

Petitioner seeks specific grievance redressal mechanism

According to the petitioner, he made several representations through 2025 seeking restoration of his family’s names, but these went unaddressed. He sought a direction to the Election Commission of India (ECI) to devise a specific form and grievance redressal procedure to adjudicate complaints of wrongful or negligent deletion from the voters’ list.

The family, originally enrolled in the Bahadurpura/Charminar Assembly constituency, contended that they had remained continuously registered as voters and that, without immediate restoration of their names, it would be impossible to properly identify and map their records during the ongoing 2026 revision.

ECI cites SIR mechanism for inclusion

Appearing for the ECI, counsel submitted that the SIR process itself provided for inclusion of voters whose names had gone missing from the rolls. Since the petitioner’s family had last been enumerated in the SIR conducted in 2002, they could submit fresh enumeration forms to the jurisdictional Booth Level Officers (BLO) for inclusion. 

The ECI added that eligible persons could submit such forms for incorporation in the draft electoral roll, scheduled to be published on July 31.

Taking these submissions on record, the bench observed that the SIR exercise itself constituted a statutory procedure for inclusion and correction of electoral rolls. Given the availability of this efficacious alternative remedy, the court held it was not inclined to exercise its extraordinary writ jurisdiction to intervene in the ongoing electoral revision process.

The bench accordingly directed the petitioner and his family to submit the prescribed enumeration forms during the revision exercise. It clarified that if their names continued to be excluded from the electoral roll even after the revision process was completed, they would be at liberty to pursue the appellate remedies available under election law before the competent authorities, and thereafter seek appropriate legal recourse in accordance with law.