The Election Commission of India issued a detailed clarification on Sunday after widespread social-media speculation questioned the sudden rise in Bihar’s voter numbers between the announcement of the Assembly election schedule and the actual polling dates. According to senior officials, the state had an electorate of roughly 7.43 crore when the dates were declared. However, under election rules, the window for submitting Form 6 – the application used by eligible citizens to have their names included in the electoral roll – remains open for an additional 10 to 13 days, depending on the phase of polling. For the first phase in Bihar, these applications were accepted until 10 October, while the deadline for the second phase extended to 13 October.
Once these statutory deadlines passed, electoral officers continued processing all valid Form 6 submissions to ensure that no eligible voter was excluded from the rolls. By the time polling took place, the total number of registered voters had risen to 7,45,26,858. The rolls also showed that 7,69,356 individuals were voting for the first time, reflecting new additions through the revision process. The Commission further noted that NOTA attracted 9,10,710 votes — amounting to 8.81 percent of all ballots cast — an unusually high figure that drew attention during the post-poll analysis. Officials stressed that the incremental rise in voter numbers was simply due to the legally mandated inclusion of all pending Form 6 entries and not the result of any irregularity.
The clarification was prompted by a public query raised by the Congress, which pointed out that Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, at his 6 October press briefing, had mentioned an electorate of 7.42 crore based on the rolls published on 30 September after the Special Summary Revision. In contrast, the Commission’s post-poll press release cited a figure of 7.45 crore. The party questioned how nearly three lakh additional voters appeared in the rolls within that short window. Responding to this, the Election Commission explained that the 30 September publication represented the final rolls for that phase of revision, but the law still permits citizens to register until ten days before the last date of nominations in each phase. Between 1 October and the applicable cut-offs, all valid applications were processed, and approximately three lakh eligible names were added accordingly. That updated figure was the one reflected in the Commission’s post-poll documentation.
The explanation came amid heightened political tensions in Bihar following the National Democratic Alliance’s dominant victory in the 2025 Assembly elections. The NDA surged far ahead of the Mahagathbandhan, securing a decisive mandate. The BJP increased its tally from 74 seats in 2020 to 89, while the JD(U) made a dramatic jump from 43 seats to 85. In contrast, the RJD suffered a steep decline, dropping to 25 seats from its earlier 75, and the Congress recorded one of its weakest performances in years, falling to just six seats from the 19 it had won previously.
