External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L.K. Advani, Election Commissioner Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, and former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia were among several prominent names on Delhi’s draft electoral roll to be identified for notices either for “logical discrepancies” flagged by the Election Commission’s (EC’s) software or under the “no mapping” category.
Economist and Padma awardee Bibek Debroy, who died in November 2024, also figures in Delhi’s draft roll and has been flagged for “no mapping” with the previous Special Intensive Revision (SIR) roll.
Notices are being generated to verify documents in cases of logical discrepancies in electors’ records and to establish eligibility in cases of “no mapping”. A list of those for whom notices were generated was published on Friday (September 18, 2026). It was reported on Saturday that Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta, former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, and former Union Ministers Kapil Sibal and Subramanian Swamy were among those on the list.
Debroy, who had served as chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council and was 69 when he passed away, is listed as a 70-year-old elector in the Delhi Cantonment Assembly constituency in the draft electoral roll published on August 31, The Hindu has found. He has further been listed in the list of 33.1 lakh electors against whom notices have been issued. A notice was generated against his name because his record is unmapped to the previous SIR roll.
Under the EC’s guidelines for the SIR, the draft electoral roll was prepared on the basis of duly filled enumeration forms received and successfully verified by booth-level officers (BLOs). The guidelines also state that members of the judiciary, public representatives, holders of declared offices and personalities from fields including arts, culture, journalism, sports and public service are to be included in the draft roll so that necessary documents can be collected during the claims and objections period.
However, Debroy’s name had remained on Delhi’s electoral roll through the 2025 Assembly election, despite deletions carried out during the subsequent summary revision, pre-SIR mapping exercise and during enumeration phase.
Current and former election officials
A voter in Delhi Cantonment constituency, Election Commissioner Mr. Sandhu’s name was flagged for the “self-name mismatch” discrepancy, which means a mismatch between the name given during the current SIR process and the previous roll. The electoral registration officer (ERO) of the constituency later said in a press note that Mr. Sandhu’s name has been validated for inclusion in the final electoral roll after “documents, facts, and details” were verified.
Notices were also generated for two former Chief Election Commissioners (CEC) of India. Sushil Chandra and wife Neelu Chandra have been flagged for “no mapping with previous SIR”. The same reason was also given for former CEC Arun Goel’s notice. Mr. Chandra served as 24th CEC from 2021 to 2022, and Mr. Goel served from 2022 till he resigned from the role ahead of the general elections in 2024.
Other prominent figures
Mr. Jaishankar and his wife, Kyoko Somekawa Jaishankar, have also been flagged for notice for “no mapping” with the last SIR. For the same reason, former BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya has been issued a notice, while “self name mismatch” has been flagged in the case of his wife, Gauri Malviya.
Also in the unmapped category were Mr. Advani, his daughter Pratibha Advani and daughter-in-law Geetika Advani. Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri’s name was also in the list under the same category.
Several other prominent names also figure in the list. In the Jangpura constituency, sociologist and social psychologist Ashis Nandy, senior advocates Indira Jaising and Anand Grover, and political communications consultant Dilip Cherian were flagged for notices, all marked “unmapped with Last SIR”. Journalist Sheela Bhatt was flagged for a “self-name mismatch” and senior advocate Huzefa Ahmadi for no mapping. In Kalkaji constituency, economist Deepak Nayyar was flagged for a “parent name mismatch”.
No reason given
While Mr. Sisodia and his family have been flagged for notices, no reason has been given for why he was on the list. For his wife, Seema Sisodia, “self-name mismatch” has been cited and “parent name mismatch” has been cited for their son, Meer Sisodia.
In the case of Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi, too, the slot for the reason his name was flagged was left blank.
There are at least 63,000 such entries in the list where the column for the reason for which notices were generated remained blank, as per analysis by The Hindu.
Mr. Sibal held a press conference over his and his wife’s names being flagged for notices, and said that his enumeration form was duly filled with his details from the 2002 SIR roll of Bihar and handed to the BLO. Despite this, the EC software has flagged him for being “unmapped with the last SIR”, he said.
Complaints
Delhi has, meanwhile, seen complaints from citizens who said their names were missing from the draft roll despite submitting enumeration forms, as well as cases of electors being wrongly marked “dead” or “shifted”. A total of 47.56 lakh voters have been excluded from the draft roll and placed in the ASDD (absent, shifted, dead or duplicate) category.
The 33.1 lakh electors flagged for logical discrepancies or no mapping constitute over one-third of the 97.5 lakh electors in the draft roll. Verification and disposal of these cases are to be completed by October 29, with the final electoral roll scheduled to be published on November 4.
The list also includes public figures such as former Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar and his wife Sudesh Dhankhar, former Supreme Court judge Justice Madan B. Lokur, Delhi Minister Parvesh Sahib Singh, former Delhi BJP president Virendra Kumar Sachdeva, historian Romila Thapar and New Delhi MP Bansuri Swaraj.
Electors in the “no mapping” category will have to establish their eligibility by submitting documents from the 12 documents prescribed by the EC for the verification process.
A senior election official said prominent leaders and other well-known personalities would not be required to visit hearing centres. Electoral Registration Officers will prepare a list of such cases and direct Booth Level Officers to visit their registered addresses to verify the records and resolve the discrepancies, the official said.
Published – September 20, 2026 12:23 pm IST
