News Today: Sanju Varma, Harishankar Gupta, Ghanshyam Tiwari on SIR Deletions

In an interview with India Today, former Chief Election Commissioner Dr. S.Y. Quraishi addressed concerns surrounding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, voter deletions, and the setting up of tribunals to handle millions of pending voter claims across states like Delhi and West Bengal. Dr. Quraishi highlighted that disenfranchising citizens for procedural issues violates fundamental constitutional guarantees, remarking, "They have put the country into chaos, and somebody should be answerable for it." He argued against burdening the judiciary with routine executive responsibilities such as maintaining electoral rolls. Dr. Quraishi urged the Election Commission of India to submit an affidavit to the Supreme Court guaranteeing that eligible citizens are not excluded from voter lists.

A massive backlog in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls has surfaced in West Bengal, with over 37 lakh appeals pending before tribunals. Calculations based on the Election Commission's affidavit in the Supreme Court indicate clearing this backlog could take nearly 12 years at the current pace, prompting the poll panel to propose increasing appellate tribunals from 19 to 42. In Bengal, around 27 lakh voters were deleted from rolls, while 38.3 lakh total appeals were filed against exclusions and inclusions. Meanwhile, the SIR controversy has expanded to Delhi, where nearly 33% of voters were excluded from the draft list and 33.3 lakh notices have been issued due to mismatches, age discrepancies, and mapping issues from the 2002 voter list. High-profile figures, including External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, and CBI Director Praveen Sood, have also received notices. The Election Commission clarified that receiving a notice does not mean immediate deletion, assuring that corrections and hearings will follow proper procedures.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has announced plans to introduce measures banning the burqa and niqab in schools, capping the number of foreign pupils per class, and requiring certain parents to attend Italian language lessons. Framed as integration rules, the proposals come as immigration remains a key issue ahead of Italy's upcoming general elections. The proposed measures aim to establish legal limits on foreign students in classrooms, build on existing 30 percent caps, and address integration difficulties faced by foreign students and their families. The draft proposals will be presented to the cabinet before undergoing the legislative process to become law.

A debate on India Today focuses on the shocking lapses and alleged cover-up in a high-profile Tamil Nadu POCSO investigation involving Veeramani. Political analyst Dr Sumanth C. Raman strongly argued that the state police cannot impartially investigate their own senior officials and urged the state government to transfer the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation, noting: 'Clearly somebody wanted to cover it up... this case should be handed over to the CBI.' Meanwhile, TVK national spokesperson Felix Gerald asserted that the administration under Chief Minister Joseph Vijay maintains zero tolerance for crimes against women and children, assuring that no culprit or complicit official will escape accountability. Political analyst Harish Mohammed Ibrahim countered TVK's assertions by highlighting previous actions and questioning political double standards, sparking an intense clash during the broadcast over police closure reports, political interference, and judicial intervention by the POCSO court magistrate.