Dhruv Rathee Joins Bengaluru ‘People’s Tribunal’ Over Voter List Revision

YouTuber Dhruv Rathee joined Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke and actor Prakash Raj at Bengaluru’s Freedom Park on Thursday, October 8, 2026, for a “People’s Tribunal” on electoral roll revisions.

The CJP and civil society groups organized the gathering to hear complaints from people who reported losing their names from voter lists during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR). Participants demanded the scrapping of the exercise and the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.

SIR Background and Voter Exclusions

The Election Commission conducts SIR to verify and update electoral rolls. The process aims to register eligible citizens and remove duplicate entries, deceased voters and people who have permanently moved from their registered addresses.

By early September, published data recorded more than 13 crore names excluded from draft electoral rolls across 30 states and Union Territories. These figures concerned draft lists, which undergo claims and corrections before final publication. They did not establish a verified total of eligible voters wrongly excluded.

Before the Bengaluru gathering, the Election Commission had directed authorities in 20 states and Union Territories where SIR had ended to conduct special enrolment campaigns. Eligible voters left out of the rolls were allowed to apply through Form 6.

Voter Complaints and Protest Demands

Dipke said some people attending the tribunal had been marked deceased in electoral records despite being alive. He called for accountability over disputed exclusions.

Rathee questioned the Election Commission’s disclosure of voter deletion records and said he attended independently of any political party. He referred to Bihar, where roughly 65 lakh names were omitted from the 2025 draft roll. On August 14, 2025, the Supreme Court ordered publication of those names and the reasons for exclusion.

Rathee also alleged roughly 70,000 voters in West Bengal were removed before the Assembly elections and restored after the results. Prakash Raj raised concerns about exclusions affecting tribal communities, low-income voters, Muslims and other minorities. These were claims made by the speakers.

At the Bengaluru event, Dipke announced a march to Jantar Mantar in New Delhi for October 10. He said the campaign would continue until Kumar resigned, including if organizers faced detention or arrest.