Thiruvananthapuram: The Election Commission of India will implement the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in Kerala and other states by October-November. As per reports, the EC has asked the state election officers to be ready for the SIR rollout by September 30, indicating that the voter list cleanup exercise would take place as early as October-November.

Earlier, the Kerala Chief Election Officer declared that SIR will be implemented in the state in the model of Bihar. The announcement came even as the state is gearing up for local body polls and assembly elections. In Kerala, the electoral roll of 2002 will be taken as the base for the revision.

At a conference of state chief electoral officers (CEOs) earlier this month, the EC top brass asked them to be ready for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) rollout in the next 10 to 15 days. But for the sake of greater clarity, the deadline of September 30 was set.

PTI reported that CEOs have been instructed to keep voter lists for their states, as published after the last SIR, in preparation.

Several state CEOs have already put up the voter lists published after their last SIR on their websites. The website of the Delhi CEO features the voter list from 2008, when the previous comprehensive revision took place in the national capital. In Uttarakhand, the last SIR took place in 2006, and the electoral roll from that year is now on the state CEO's website.

The last SIR in states will serve as the cut-off date, just as the EC is using the 2003 voter list of Bihar for intensive revision. Most states had the last SIR between 2002 and 2004 and have nearly completed mapping of current electors with those as per the last intensive revision.

The EC has said that after Bihar, SIR will be carried out in the entire country.

Assembly elections in Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal are due in 2026.

The primary aim of the intensive revision is to weed out foreign illegal migrants by checking their place of birth. The move assumes significance in the wake of a crackdown in various states on illegal foreign migrants, including from Bangladesh and Myanmar.