"Aadhaar-Based Face Authentication Proposed to Reform Electoral Roll Revision"
Special Intensive Revision (SIR)
A comprehensive ECI exercise to update electoral rolls by removing ineligible entries and enrolling new voters.
EPIC (Electoral Photo Identity Card)
The voter identity card issued by ECI, now linkable voluntarily to Aadhaar under the 2021 amendment.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) derives its authority to maintain and revise electoral rolls from Article 324 of the Constitution, which vests superintendence, direction, and control of all elections in the Commission. The specific statutory framework for roll revision is the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960. These provide for three key forms: Form 6 (enrolment of new voters), Form 7 (deletion of ineligible entries), and Form 8 (correction of existing entries). The constitutional right to vote flows from Articles 325 and 326, Article 325 prohibits exclusion on grounds of religion, race, caste, or sex, while Article 326 establishes adult suffrage. Any roll-revision exercise must therefore minimise wrongful exclusion, particularly of marginalised populations.
Parallel to this electoral infrastructure, India built the Aadhaar ecosystem under the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016. The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), established in 2009 and given statutory backing by the 2016 Act, issues a 12-digit unique identity number based on biometric data (fingerprints, iris scans) and demographic data. A critical legal boundary runs through the Aadhaar Act itself: Aadhaar proves identity and residence, not citizenship. This distinction was confirmed by the Supreme Court's nine-judge bench in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2018), which upheld Aadhaar's constitutional validity while restricting its mandatory use to welfare benefits funded from the Consolidated Fund of India. The Court also held that the State cannot share Aadhaar data with private corporations, and that Aadhaar metadata cannot be stored beyond three months. Aadhaar's open Application Programming Interface (API) architecture supports multiple authentication modes, fingerprint, iris, and face, returning only a yes/no response, never the underlying biometric data. This privacy-by-design feature is central to the proposal this article advances. The Election Laws (Amendment) Act, 2021 introduced voluntary Aadhaar–Voter ID linking by amending Section 23 of the RPA, 1950, establishing a legal pathway for the integration this article recommends.
The ECI's credibility in conducting elections has been a recurring concern. Just as questions about Electronic Voting Machine reliability have forced the ECI to demonstrate procedural transparency, the SIR's document-intensive method raises parallel questions: whether the process is inclusive, whether deletions follow due process, and whether the Commission can be trusted to protect the franchise of the most vulnerable voters. The Supreme Court's intervention pressing ECI on the slow disposal of deletion appeals in West Bengal is a direct instance of this credibility challenge.
The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) is a comprehensive roll-cleaning exercise, distinct from routine annual summary revisions. It deploys Booth Level Officers (BLOs) for door-to-door verification, requiring citizens to produce documentary proof of eligibility within compressed deadlines. The current SIR, rolling out in phases since mid-2025, has already deleted over 13 crore names from electoral rolls across most of the country. The Supreme Court upheld the exercise in May 2026 but drew a sharp constitutional line: the final determination of citizenship belongs to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) under the Citizenship Act, not to the ECI or its field officers.
This ruling exposes a structural flaw in the SIR's design. The documents it demands, birth certificates, passports, domicile certificates, are not universally held. A passport, held by under 8 per cent of Indians, has been clarified by the Ministry of External Affairs to be a travel document, not proof of citizenship. Aadhaar proves identity and residence but not citizenship. Voter ID and PAN prove neither. Birth registration was historically patchy for the poor, women, and rural populations. No document in common circulation can definitively establish citizenship at the doorstep. Historical precedents confirm this: the Multipurpose National Identity Card pilot was abandoned as unworkable; the Assam National Register of Citizens excluded 19 lakh people and caused enormous distress without resolving the underlying question; the National Population Register enumerated 'usual residents', citizens and non-citizens alike, because the MHA itself found a field test of citizenship impractical. …
Consider the following statements :
1.Aadhaar card can be used as a proof of citizenship or domicile.
2.Once issued, Aadhaar number cannot be deactivated or omitted by the Issuing Authority.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
The identity platform 'Aadhaar' provides open "Application Programming Interfaces (APIs)". What does it imply ?
1.It can be integrated into any electronic device.
2.Online authentication using iris is possible.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Consider the following statements:
1.'Aadhaar' metadata cannot be stored for more than three months.
2.State cannot enter into any contract with private corporations for sharing of Aadhaar data.
3.Aadhaar is mandatory for obtaining insurance products.
4.Aadhaar is mandatory for getting benefits funded out of the Consolidated Fund of India.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
In the light of recent controversy regarding the use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM), what are the challenges before the Election Commission of India to ensure the trustworthiness of elections in India?
Consider the following statements regarding Aadhaar:
1.Aadhaar can be used as proof of citizenship under the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016.
2.The State cannot enter into any contract with private corporations for sharing of Aadhaar data.
3.Aadhaar is mandatory for obtaining benefits funded out of the Consolidated Fund of India.
4.Aadhaar metadata cannot be stored for more than three months.
Which of the statements given above are correct?
With reference to the Election Laws (Amendment) Act, 2021, consider the following statements:
1.It made Aadhaar–Voter ID linking mandatory for all registered voters.
2.It amended Section 23 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950.
3.It introduced four qualifying dates per year for enrolment of newly eligible voters.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Consider the following statements regarding the constitutional basis of electoral rights in India:
1.Article 325 prohibits exclusion from electoral rolls on grounds of religion, race, caste, or sex.
2.Article 326 provides for adult suffrage as the basis of elections to the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies.
3.The Election Commission of India derives its authority to revise electoral rolls directly from the Representation of the People Act, 1950, not from the Constitution.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Match the following electoral roll forms with their purposes:
List I (Form) — List II (Purpose)
A.Form 6 — 1. Correction of entries in electoral rolls
B.Form 7 — 2. Enrolment of a new voter
C.Form 8 — 3. Deletion of an ineligible entry
Select the correct answer using the codes given below:
With reference to Aadhaar's technical architecture and authentication capabilities, consider the following statements:
1.Aadhaar's open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) allow it to be integrated into electronic devices for authentication purposes.
2.Aadhaar supports iris-based online authentication in addition to fingerprint-based authentication.
3.When Aadhaar authentication is performed, the underlying biometric data is transmitted to the requesting entity.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
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