Odisha will use paper ballots for panchayat polls and EVMs for urban elections, SEC says

Odisha will continue to use paper ballots for panchayat elections and electronic voting machines for urban local body polls, state election commissioner Madhusudan Padhi said. The State Election Commission is preparing electoral rolls for the 2027 panchayat and urban local body elections, with a door-to-door survey planned from October 26 to November 7.

The commission will base ward-wise electoral rolls on the voter list published on Sept 21 after the Special Intensive Revision, according to The Times of India. The survey is intended to find eligible voters absent from the list and to align household members under the same ward and polling booth.

Padhi described that arrangement as a way to make voting more convenient, The New Indian Express reported. The New Indian Express reported that a pilot survey covering all 30 districts found 7.61 per cent of voters still listed despite death or migration, while 4.87 per cent of eligible voters were absent from the rolls.

Those findings identify two separate roll-maintenance issues: names that may need removal and eligible voters who need to be added. The commission's planned household survey is intended to help address the latter and organise voters by ward and booth. The electoral method will differ between the two levels of local elections.

Rural panchayat voters cast ballots for ward member, sarpanch, panchayat samiti member and zilla parishad member. Officials estimate that using EVMs for those contests would require around 3.6 lakh machines across more than 91,000 booths, The Times of India reported. The commissioner’s announcement maintains paper ballots for those elections instead.

By comparison, the state’s simultaneous Lok Sabha and assembly elections use around 75,000 EVMs at nearly 37,000 polling stations, while urban local body elections require about 12,000 machines, according to The Times of India. The report does not give a reason for the different voting methods; it records the commissioner's announcement and the estimated machine requirements.

The Hindu’s headline also reported that Odisha would continue with ballot papers for rural polls and EVMs for urban voting. The draft rolls will be followed by a claims-and-objections period, and the final lists are due to be released on February 10 after verification, The New Indian Express reported.

The Times of India said electors will have 20 days to submit claims or objections and that objections seeking deletion of names can be made using Form 17, Form 4 and Form 8. The urban local body elections are planned for March-April, while the survey window runs from October 26 to November 7.

The roll preparation is therefore a concrete administrative step ahead of the planned local elections, alongside the commission’s decision to retain paper ballots for panchayat contests and use EVMs for urban polls.