Civil society groups on Thursday (July 16, 2026) wrote to the Chief Election Commissioner seeking his urgent appointment for discussing a two-month extension to the SIR schedule in Maharashtra.They have raised concerns such as alleged haphazardous and inconsistent enumeration process, the practical difficulties faced by the BLOs in undertaking the process, among others. “We have sought Gyanesh Kumar’s appointment during his upcoming visit to Mumbai and Pune to raise important concerns regarding the Special Intensive Revision – Phase III, in Maharashtra,” Ulka Mahajan of Maharashtra SIR Jagruti Abhiyan told The Hindu.The platform consists of 20 different organisations working across Maharashtra. These organisations had written to the Election Commission on July 10 as well.“We the undersigned citizens’ groups and individuals are actively working with the election commission’s setup at district and city levels in Maharashtra to ensure every eligible voter gets included in the list of voters. We have been engaging with Chief Electoral Officer, Maharashtra and the Booth Level Officers (BLOs), to update issues faced by citizens during this process. The enumeration phase is currently ongoing in Maharashtra and a number of serious issues have come up with the process, adding to the concerns already raised by us. The enumeration process in cities like Mumbai is going on in a haphazard and inconsistent manner, with all BLOs following their own process and no unified instructions in that regard. Moreover, pre-SIR mapping had not been carried out of most of the areas, further increasing the load,” the letter stated.Insufficient periodThe letter stated that the 30-day period is insufficient for the proper and fair conduct of the exercise. It said that the process ends on July 29, and yet only 22% forms had been digitised in the State.“In cities such as Mumbai, as low as approximately 4% forms are digitized and less than one third forms are distributed by 14th July 2026. The enumeration exercise itself started with massive delay due to torrential rains, confusion and protests by BLOs. BLOs who are School teachers, Anganwadi workers have been provided SIR work in addition to their existing workload and are expected to do the SIR work off duty, causing massive strain and hardship to them. This is affecting both their important work as teachers and anganwadi workers, and also their diligent working in the SIR process. There are some localities where BLOs have not even been able to begin the process. In most areas the form distribution by BLOs is not being done house to house as mandated or directly to voters, and is being done in arbitrary and hurried fashion given the time constraints,” it said.Large-scale exclusions and wrongful deletions likelyThe organisations expressed fear that if an extension was not granted, it would lead to large-scale exclusions and wrongful deletions from the voters’ list. It said that since there were no immediate elections in the state, and since such an extension was already granted to four states, the request should be considered by the Election Commission.The signatories include Bharat Jodo Abhiyan, Forum Against Oppression of Women, Hasrat-e-Zindagi Mamuli, Jamaat e Islami Hind, Mumbai, Jan Hakk Sangarsh Samiti, Loktantrik Kamgar Union, MAKAAM , among others. Published - July 17, 2026 10:31 am IST