The Election Commission of India has proposed increasing the number of appellate tribunals in West Bengal from 19 to 42 to speed up the disposal of a massive backlog of appeals arising from the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.
In an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court this week, the poll panel said around 3.8 million appeals had been filed against decisions concerning the inclusion or exclusion of voters. Of these, about 3.7 million remain pending.
The proposed number of tribunals corresponds to West Bengal’s 42 Lok Sabha constituencies. The ECI said the expansion would help ensure the appeals are disposed of expeditiously.
More than 2.2 million appeals by excluded voters
The ECI’s latest figures show that 2.21 million appeals were filed by voters whose names had been deleted from the electoral rolls, seeking their inclusion. Another 1.61 million appeals challenge the inclusion of names and seek their exclusion.
The figures were submitted in response to an application by Trinamool Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien, who is among the petitioners challenging the SIR exercise before the Supreme Court.
The latest data also indicate that around 82% of the 2.716 million voters deleted during the SIR process have appealed against their exclusion.
The ECI said the present 19 tribunals were insufficient to deal with the volume of cases and proposed increasing their number to match the number of parliamentary constituencies in the state.
Supreme Court had sought detailed appeal data
The proposal comes after the Supreme Court sought a detailed break-up of the appeals pending before the tribunals, including the number concerning inclusion and exclusion of names.
A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, with Justices Joymalya Bagchi and J V Mohana, had also asked the ECI to provide details of cases disposed of and the consequential steps taken to update electoral rolls after tribunal orders.
The court had earlier indicated that the pending appeals should be adjudicated in a time-bound manner and said additional tribunals could be considered if required.
27.16 lakh names were deleted during SIR
The SIR process involved scrutiny of 60.06 lakh electors flagged by the ECI for what it described as "logical discrepancies". Around 700 judicial officers from West Bengal, Jharkhand and Odisha were tasked with determining their eligibility.
Following the adjudication, 27.16 lakh names were deleted, while the remaining electors were retained on the rolls. The Supreme Court subsequently ordered the establishment of appellate tribunals to hear challenges to these decisions. Nineteen tribunals began functioning in April 2026.
The scale of the pending cases has raised concerns over the time required to resolve voter-list disputes, particularly with further local elections approaching.
Earlier tribunal data showed high restoration rate
Earlier data submitted to the Supreme Court showed that the tribunals had disposed of 82,782 appeals by August. Of these, 75,443 names, or about 91%, were restored to the electoral rolls, while 7,339 were excluded.
The Supreme Court had been told that only 1,607 electors were restored to the rolls before the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections following tribunal orders.
The ECI’s latest proposal therefore seeks to expand the tribunal network substantially, with one tribunal corresponding to each of West Bengal’s 42 parliamentary constituencies, in an effort to clear the outstanding appeals more quickly.