Is CEC Gyanesh Kumar a citizen of India?, asks TMC MP Saket Gokhale Over SIR Data
Trinamool Congress (TMC) Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha Saket Gokhale has mounted a fierce attack on the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Gyanesh Kumar, publicly questioning his voter registration records and citizenship status under the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise.
In a detailed statements, the MP alleged that data discrepancies regarding the CEC’s own entry in the draft electoral roll expose systemic flaws in the revision process currently being rolled out across the national capital, Delhi, and several other Indian states.
Detailing his findings from official documents, Gokhale pointed out that the CEC is listed as a voter in the draft SIR electoral roll for Delhi. According to the MP, Kumar is registered in the roll under the name “Gyanesh Kumar, son of Subodh Kumar”.
Explaining the mechanics of the revision exercise, the MP stated that under the official rules of the current SIR process, if an individual cannot be mapped back to the baseline data of the previous SIR conducted in 2002/2003, their entry is automatically flagged as a “logical discrepancy”. Individuals facing such flags are subsequently issued official notices requiring them to verify their credentials.
Gokhale noted that Kumar was born in Uttar Pradesh, served as an IAS officer of the Kerala cadre, and was subsequently posted in Delhi. Based on this background, the MP conducted a comprehensive search across the historical 2002/2003 SIR records for all three jurisdictions: Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, and Delhi.
“Shockingly, in all three states, there is nobody registered as Gyanesh Kumar, son of Subodh Kumar in the last SIR,” the MP claimed.
Gokhale argued that if such a historical baseline entry does not exist, standard ECI protocols dictate that the CEC’s current inclusion on the voter list must be classified as a “logical discrepancy”. Consequently, he asserted, the head of the poll panel should have been served an official notice as an unmapped voter.
Demand for immediate clarification from the election watchdog was voiced by the MP, who posed four direct questions to the ECI:
– Which state’s previous SIR is CEC Gyanesh Kumar marked in?
– Was Gyanesh Kumar a registered voter in 2002/2003?
– If he is missing from the last SIR in Kerala, Delhi, and Uttar Pradesh, how is his name on the current voter list?
– Has Gyanesh Kumar received a notice for “logical discrepancy” and for being an “unmapped voter”?
“The country must know,” the MP emphasised, highlighting the need for full transparency.
The controversy arrives amidst massive nationwide friction over the Special Intensive Revision. In Delhi alone, the draft SIR rolls have led to the omission of roughly 47.57 lakh voters—nearly a third of the capital’s entire electorate—triggering intense public confusion and political outcry.
Across the country, the ECI’s door-to-door mapping and algorithmic matching against decades-old voter bases have resulted in millions of citizens receiving notices or facing potential deletion. Multiple opposition parties—including the TMC, Congress, and Left entities—have strongly condemned the SIR.
Opposition leaders have characterised the exercise as an arbitrary administrative burden, with Gokhale and others going so far as to label the SIR a “back-door NRC” designed to disenfranchise legitimate Indian citizens due to minor name spelling errors and flawed software reconciliation.
