New Delhi: Murmurs of discontent with the Election Commission’s push for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar can be heard from within Janata Dal United (JDU), the BJP’s partner in the Centre and the state.

The JDU MP from Bihar’s Banka Giridhari Yadav on Wednesday said it took him 10 days to collect all the documents enlisted by the central poll panel for the SIR, which was launched earlier this month and has seen protests from the Opposition parties.

“This (SIR) has been forcefully imposed on us. At least six months’ time should have been given for this,” Yadav told the media outside the Parliament, adding that he was expressing his personal views. “It doesn’t matter what the party is saying. This is the truth. If I can’t say the truth, why have I become an MP?”

On Tuesday, the Election Commission (EC) had stated it had identified 18 lakh voters in Bihar as deceased, 26 lakh have moved to other constituencies and seven lakh duplicate voters. Of the 7, 89, 69, 844 voters in the state – which is likely to go to polls in October or November this year – around 97.30 per cent or 76, 834, 228 voters had filled the fresh enumeration forms issued by the poll officials.

“Election Commission has not practical knowledge. It neither knows the history nor the geography of Bihar. It took 10 days for me to collect all the documents. My son stays in America. How will he do the signatures in just a month?” asked the Banka MP.

The Banka MP is not the only voice from the BJP ally to have spoken out against the EC’s drive. The Parbatta MLA from the JDU, Sanjeev Kumar also questioned the procedure.

“The migrant labourers who are working in other state, how will they appear for verification? They will be ousted from the electoral rolls. The EC should have made adequate arrangements to ensure that no genuine voter’s name is deleted for logistic reasons.