Hyderabad: Raising concerns over the exclusive use of Telugu in electoral enumeration forms for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR)-2026, the Telangana high court on Thursday directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to file its response and posted the matter for further hearing on June 29.The court was hearing a petition filed by Karimnagar-based social worker M A Mujeeb, who challenged the distribution of SIR forms solely in Telugu across districts outside the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) limits.Justice Pulla Karthik questioned the rationale behind the policy, observing that it could place linguistic minorities, students and citizens who are not proficient in Telugu at a disadvantage.The petitioner referred to the ECI’s Manual on Electoral Rolls, which prescribes bilingual formatting and the availability of English versions in metropolitan and multilingual contexts. He pointed out that representations submitted on June 16 and June 18, urging the Commission to provide bilingual or English formats across the state, had not received any response.Mujeeb also reminded the court of a similar electoral exercise undertaken in 2002, which allegedly led to widespread data-entry errors and misspellings due to faulty translation and transliteration from Telugu to English.“An exclusive Telugu rollout creates immense practical difficulties for a large section of residents, including professionals, students and migrants who cannot adequately read or comprehend the language,” he contended. He further argued that the decision would adversely affect non-Telugu speakers, migrant workers and minority communities residing in rural and semi-urban districts.ECI standing counsel Kopal Sharraf informed the court that, under the existing rules, electoral forms are distributed in the official language of the state, which in Telangana is Telugu.However, Sharraf said a decision had subsequently been taken to provide English forms following a meeting with all political parties. He informed the court that booth-level officers visiting voters’ homes were carrying forms in Telugu, English and Urdu, enabling citizens to fill them in the language of their choice.
