“If someone who spent his professional life in journalism can lose his voting rights without explanation, supporters say it raises troubling questions about what ordinary citizens may be facing.”
A leading journalists’ organisation in India has come to the defence of veteran editor R. Rajagopal, accusing authorities of putting his voting rights and passport renewal at risk after his name was removed from the electoral roll during a nationwide voter verification exercise.
The Editors Guild of India said Rajagopal’s experience reflects the growing concerns surrounding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), a programme launched by the Election Commission of India (ECI) to identify and remove ineligible voters from electoral rolls.
The commission says the exercise is designed to improve the accuracy of voter lists. Critics, however, argue that many legitimate voters have been removed without sufficient justification.
In a statement released on Sunday, the Editors Guild said Rajagopal’s case should concern every Indian.
“This case highlights the misery that millions of Indians are being put through because of the Special Intensive Revision exercise.”
The organisation added that if someone as well known as Rajagopal could lose his voting rights, the impact on ordinary citizens could be even more severe.
Rajagopal, who served as editor of The Telegraph newspaper in Kolkata, says he has lived in the city’s Ballygunge constituency for more than 25 years and has been a registered voter since 2010.
Writing in The Wire, he said election officials removed his name because neither his nor his father’s name appeared in the 2002 electoral rolls, which are being used as the main reference point during the verification exercise.
According to Rajagopal, that decision came despite his submitting official documents, including his school matriculation certificate.
“No reason was furnished for my exclusion even after I submitted my matriculation certificate, and my appeal is now pending before one of the tribunals constituted pursuant to the Supreme Court’s directions,” he wrote.
The issue did not end with his voting rights.
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Rajagopal said officials later informed him that police verification for renewing his passport could not be completed because his name was no longer on the electoral roll.
“I was puzzled because I could not find any public document that listed the voter identity card as a mandatory document for passport renewal,” he wrote.
The Election Commission of India has not publicly responded to the allegations surrounding Rajagopal’s case. The BBC said it had contacted election officials for comment.
The controversy comes against the backdrop of one of India’s biggest electoral roll revisions in years.
Since the SIR exercise began on 4 November 2025, around 60 million names have reportedly been removed across 12 states and federally administered territories. About nine million of those removals were in West Bengal alone. Another phase of the exercise is now underway in 16 states and three union territories.
Rajagopal’s case has sparked widespread reaction among journalists, politicians and civil society groups.
Veteran television journalist Rajdeep Sardesai expressed support on social media.
“Scary part is this could happen to anyone!”
Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate suggested Rajagopal was facing consequences for holding those in power to account through his journalism, while M.A. Baby, General Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), said the case reinforced long-standing fears about the voter verification exercise.
“We warned that the SIR exercise would disenfranchise the poor and vulnerable sections of our country. But now, even an editor of repute and an acclaimed journalist like R. Rajagopal has been denied his right to vote.”
Rajagopal’s appeal remains before a tribunal, and the outcome could become an important test of the voter revision programme.
For many watching the case, the question is no longer just about one journalist’s name on an electoral roll. It is whether a process designed to protect elections can also protect the rights of the people it is meant to serve.
