Protests Surge as India Deletes 130 Million Voters, Disproportionately Muslims

India has removed more than 130 million names from its electoral register, triggering protests as millions contest their exclusion and evidence points to a disproportionate impact on Muslim voters.

The nationwide revision requires an electorate approaching one billion to document its eligibility.

Millions awaiting decisions on their appeals could not vote in closely contested elections earlier this year.

The election commission describes the exercise as removing duplicate and inaccurate entries.

Opposition parties, former election officials and analysts argue that it risks excluding eligible citizens while strengthening Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party.

Muslims Face Disproportionate Exclusion

India’s roughly 200 million Muslims appear to have borne a disproportionate share of the deletions.

BJP leaders have defended the revision as a campaign against “infiltrators,” language ostensibly directed at migrants from Bangladesh but increasingly applied to Muslims more broadly.

Two senior officials, speaking anonymously about the governing party’s strategy, described the political and ideological objectives behind the process to The New York Times.

One said the party was using its local organization to identify people for removal; the other linked the exercise to an earlier, unsuccessful effort to exclude undocumented Muslim immigrants through citizenship checks.

There is no strong evidence that the revision has identified substantial numbers of foreign nationals.

Yet BJP leaders have said people removed from the register would also lose access to welfare benefits reserved for citizens.

Protesters are demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.

“The heart of our democracy, which is the right to vote, is at great peril,” said Rohinton Nariman, a former solicitor general and Supreme Court judge.

Algorithms and Documentation Burdens

The register contained about 970 million names before the overhaul.

Authorities have since removed more than 20 million entries classified as belonging to dead people and another 90 million categorized as absent, relocated or otherwise ineligible.

Some voters recorded as dead are challenging their removal.

Algorithms have flagged tens of millions of entries for inconsistencies, including variations in names, family information and age gaps between siblings.

Former election officials warn that clerical mistakes can become grounds for exclusion.

“The effort, and the priority, seems to be getting rid of people on the slightest pretext,” said former election commissioner Ashok Lavasa.

Lavasa said earlier revisions relied on officials visiting households to verify voters.

The current exercise instead requires citizens to establish their eligibility, a burden complicated by poor records and missing birth certificates.

For low-income workers, repeated visits to election offices also mean lost earnings.

Third-party objections have added another route to deletion.

A New York Times review found that nearly 2,000 objections were submitted in one Karnataka constituency on a single day, overwhelmingly challenging Muslim voters.

Five individuals filed almost half.

West Bengal Appeals Under Scrutiny

The dispute is particularly acute in West Bengal, where the BJP won power in May after a revision removed about nine million names.

The Supreme Court permitted voting while millions of challenges remained unresolved. Of roughly 100,000 appeals decided so far, a majority resulted in orders restoring voters to the register.

Opposition parties have told the court that deletions exceeded the BJP’s winning margins in 82 of its 207 seats, enough to affect control of the legislature.

Court-appointed officials approved reinstating 1.6 million voters.

The election commission challenged their inclusion, blocking their return, according to its own court filing.

An Indian newspaper investigation subsequently reported that two of the three election commissioners had objected internally, saying the challenge proceeded without their knowledge.

BJP Defends the Revision

The BJP says opposition parties previously demanded the removal of duplicate and ineligible entries and are now politicizing that process.

Election Commission officials did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Opposition parties argue that institutional changes have weakened safeguards.

In 2023, Modi changed the commissioner selection committee to favor the government and passed legislation granting commissioners legal immunity.

The next national election is scheduled for 2029.