At least three out of 19 apellete tribunals set up in West Bengal to settle disputes related to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls are vacant amid a massive pendency of appeals, as Election Commission of India (ECI) awaits names from the Calcutta High Court to appoint new persons.

ECI functionaries said “at least” three tribunals are without heads.

The Calcutta High Court will send names of retired high court judges to the West Bengal chief electoral officers, who in turn will notify their appointments to the three vacant tribunals.

While these tribunals report to Calcutta High Court, ECI provides them with secretarial assistance, including staff and digital platform for online hearings.

With local and municipal elections nearing, over 37 lakh voters remain in legal limbo, raising widespread concerns over potential mass disenfranchisement.

Set up on March 21 following Supreme Court directions, the special tribunals were tasked with adjudicating disputes after millions of names were purged or contested during the SIR exercise.

However, according to submissions made in the apex court, there are shortcomings in the system.

Out of 38.3 lakh appeals, 22.2 lakh were filed by deleted voters challenging their exclusion, while 16.1 lakh contested voter inclusions.

Tribunals have resolved only about 1.02 lakh cases -a completion rate under three per cent.

At the current pace, petitioners informed the Supreme Court that clearing the backlog could take over 12 years.

The opposition has described the SIR exercise as the “biggest hijacking of democracy”, accusing the ECI of using algorithm-driven processes to disproportionately delete voters’ names from electoral rolls, allegedly targeting minority communities and traditional opposition strongholds.

The Supreme Court on Friday (April 10, 2026) refused to intervene for a woman whose name was deleted from the Tamil Nadu electoral roll in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) even as she reminded the court, as a parting shot, of its promise to step in if the SIR leads to “mass exclusions” across the country.

The petitioner, C. Geetha, said her name had been a mainstay in the State’s electoral roll over the years. She was even intending to contest as an independent candidate in the 51-Uthangarai (SC) Assembly Constituency and 52-Bargur Assembly Constituency in the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections in 2026.