Dressed in black and carrying banners that read ‘Save Democracy’ and ‘SIR is a death of democracy’, opposition leaders from the INDIA bloc staged a protest in and outside Parliament on Wednesday, demanding the immediate rollback of the Election Commission’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar.
The protest, led by senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, was marked by slogans, placards, and calls for urgent parliamentary debate. Joining them were Congress MPs Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Rajeev Shukla, among others, who accused the BJP-led central government and the Election Commission of using the revision process to disenfranchise large sections of Bihar’s population.
"The opposition is together against SIR. We will raise the issue in the House again today. Our protest will continue," said Congress MP Rajeev Shukla, reiterating the united stand of opposition parties.
Inside Parliament, repeated demands for discussion on the SIR exercise led to disruptions, forcing both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha to be adjourned until 2 PM. In Rajya Sabha, proceedings lasted less than a minute before being suspended. Lok Sabha briefly ran to introduce the National Sports Governance Bill, 2025, before being adjourned amid opposition uproar.
Congress MP Manickam Tagore submitted an adjournment motion in the Lok Sabha, slamming the SIR process as “dangerous and unconstitutional.” He accused the government of attempting to suppress the votes of the poor, Dalits, backward, and marginalised communities under the guise of voter list revisions.
“The Modi government is trying to bring back colonial-style voting systems that favour only the rich,” Tagore alleged. He further described the revision as reflective of a “Manuwadi mindset” and declared that opposition MPs would continue their protest wearing black armbands.
Congress MP K.C. Venugopal also criticised the exercise, calling it blatantly undemocratic. "For the third successive day, the INDIA Bloc under LOP Sh. @RahulGandhi's leadership is protesting against the blatantly undemocratic SIR exercise being carried out in Bihar. Parliament must take this up for urgent discussion, and the exercise must be rolled back immediately," Venugopal said in a post on X.
Congress Deputy Leader in Lok Sabha, Gaurav Gogoi, went further, directly targeting the Prime Minister and Home Minister. “The Election Commission is conducting voter suppression in Bihar. This work can only happen with the consent and at the behest of Prime Minister Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah,” he said. “We want Prime Minister Modi SIR to join the discussion. The Modi government should also clarify when the discussion on Operation Sindoor and SIR will take place,” Gogoi added.
Samajwadi Party MP Dimple Yadav also linked the SIR protest to other pressing national concerns, including the recent terror attack in Pahalgam. “The discussion should have started by now in Parliament on the SIR issue and the intelligence failure in the Pahalgam terror attack. The government wants to avoid this,” she said.
On Tuesday, opposition MPs had also gathered outside Parliament in protest, holding similar placards and raising slogans against what they called an assault on democracy.
In response to the political storm, the Election Commission of India (ECI) filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court defending the SIR process. The ECI described the petitions against the revision as “misleading” and clarified that being excluded from the voter list does not affect an individual’s citizenship. The Commission also noted that SIR is a nationwide, inclusive process, and that the revision was expedited in Bihar due to the approaching Assembly elections.
BJP leaders stood firmly behind the Election Commission. Union Ministers Chirag Paswan and Giriraj Singh defended the revision, dismissing opposition concerns as politically motivated. “The government is ready to explain everything. The Opposition is only trying to spread confusion,” said Paswan.
Giriraj Singh added, “Voter list revisions happened even before Modi became PM. This is nothing new. The Opposition is using this as a distraction.”
