Bihar: Thousands of centenarians on way out as survey sanitises voters’ list

Of the 35000 voters above the age of 100 years currently registered in Bihar, only 17000 have been found to be genuine while another 4000 voters have doubtful age credentials, according to a survey conducted by the office of state’s chief electoral officer (CEO).

Of the 35000 voters above the age of 100 years currently registered in Bihar, only 17000 have been found to be genuine while another 4000 voters have doubtful age credentials, according to a survey conducted by the office of state’s chief electoral officer (CEO), officials familiar with the matter said.

An elderly woman arrives at a polling booth in Bihar to cast her vote in 2020 state polls. (HT FILE)

“Though the number of voters more than 100 years of age is not high when compared to the state’s population of 13 crore, the verification of voters in a house-to-house survey is surely a revelation. It has revealed that around 14000 voters out of 35000 above 100 -plus years of age are already dead, but their names still exist in the electoral rolls,” said an official with the CEO office, who didn’t want to be named.

The official said that 4000 such voters were found to be alive, but they were found to be unsure of their age during the verification. “Some of them said they may have put their age wrong. So, only 17000 such voters were verified in the survey,” said the official.

The survey, conducted a month back through booth level officers (BLOs), was aimed at ascertaining the number of voters above 100 years of age who were still alive and “removing the impurities from the electoral rolls”, a euphemism for removing duplicate voters, dead and fake, from the list under the directive of the Election Commission of India (ECI).

Sources said a special app (application) was used to categorise all voters above 100 years of age to verify their genuineness.

Bihar has a total 7.58 crore electors, of which 3.97 crore are male and 3.60 crore female, while another 2418 belong to the third gender, as per rolls updated in January this year.

The number of voters above 80 years of age stood at 16.56 lakh.

Post the survey, the question that has confounded election officials is as to how so many voters above the age of 100 years managed to enlist in the rolls despite regular updation.

The reason, say officials, is twofold. One, there are legacy issues, meaning the voters’ list, despite being updated regularly, has not removed discrepancies like duplicate names, fake and dead voters.

Second, voters more than 100 years old in a large number indicate how many of them have purposely “jacked up” their age for old age pension from the state and central governments.

Under the state old age scheme in place since the 1980s under different names,, a person above 60 years of age and not getting pension from state or central governments can apply to get monthly pension, which is payable @ ₹400 for age group of 60-79 and @ ₹500 above 80-plus monthly.

“The verification of the beneficiaries is done through age in Aadhar card and place of residence is verified through Aadhar and EPIC (electors’ photo I-card),” said an official in the social welfare department, the nodal agency of implementing Mukhyamantri old age pension scheme.

“In the last many years, various checks have been put in place by the state and central governments to verify old age pension beneficiaries. However, the same may not have been deleted in the electoral rolls so far,” said another election official.

“The actual number of voters above 100 years of age would be reflected soon in the new updated list in coming months,” the official said.

When contacted for his response, CEO H R Srinivasa said, “Maintaining the purity of the electoral rolls is important. We are carrying out exercises to weed out discrepancies, if any.”

Last year, the state election department had deleted around 10 lakh names from the voters’ list through a software tailored to identify duplicate voters who were registered in more than one assembly constituency.