Bengaluru: Karnataka Chief Minister D K Shivakumar has sought additional time from the Election Commission of India for filing claims and objections to the state's draft electoral rolls published under the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR).

The request comes a day after the publication of the draft electoral roll, which has brought the voter-revision exercise into a crucial verification stage.

The draft roll contains 4,46,80,151 electors, while nearly 1.08 crore electors have been placed under the ASDDO category, covering cases classified as absent, shifted, dead, duplicate and other cases requiring further treatment during the revision process.

Shivakumar has sought additional time for the claims-and-objections process, along with greater verification support, arguing that eligible voters should have adequate opportunity to establish their eligibility and ensure that their names are included in the electoral roll.

The request comes amid growing attention to the large number of electors currently outside the draft roll.

However, the ASDDO figure should not be treated as a final number of voters permanently removed from Karnataka's electoral roll.

The draft electoral roll is an intermediate stage in the revision process. Electors whose names are missing or whose details require correction can use the prescribed claims and objections mechanism before the final roll is prepared.

This distinction is particularly important because the final electoral roll will depend on the outcome of the verification and disposal process that follows the publication of the draft.

The next stage will therefore be closely watched for the number of claims submitted, the number of cases verified and, most importantly, the number of electors whose names are restored or corrected.

For individual voters, the immediate priority is to check their names in the draft electoral roll and use the prescribed process if their details are missing or require correction.

For political parties, the claims-and-objections phase will provide the first opportunity to examine how the large draft-roll changes translate at the constituency and district levels.

The coming weeks will therefore be less about the headline number alone and more about how effectively the correction mechanism works.

The final electoral roll will provide the definitive picture of Karnataka's electorate after the revision process is completed.