How SIR Led To Mother-Son Reunion, Notorious Criminal's Arrest

What began as a routine bureaucratic exercise to clean up electoral rolls has unfolded into two extraordinary and contrasting human dramas in Madhya Pradesh - one of an emotional reunion after 22 years, and the other of the arrest of a hardened inter-state criminal with a long and violent past. The Election Commission's Special Intensive Revision (SIR) drive, aimed at verifying and updating voter records, has not only corrected data but also unexpectedly rewritten lives, reuniting a missing son with his mother in Mandsaur district and leading to the capture of a criminal accused in over 100 serious cases in Indore.

In western Madhya Pradesh's Mandsaur district, 45-year-old Vinod Gayari, who had left his home in Khilchipura village in 2003 after marrying against his family's wishes, was reunited with his mother after being missing for 22 years. Vinod had been presumed dead by his family after repeated efforts to trace him failed, and by 2012, his parents had emotionally resigned themselves to his absence. His father died in the intervening years, while his elderly mother and mentally unstable elder brother were left behind.

"We thought he had died. We couldn't find any trace of him. Then the SIR process happened. The panchayat contacted us. We went to the police station, and that's how we found him," said Radheshyam, a relative.

The turning point came in 2026 when Vinod, now working as a peon in a school in Rajasthan's Nagaur district and living there with his wife and two children, attempted to update his voter identity under the SIR process and sought the EPIC details of his parents from the 2003 electoral roll of his native village.

When the Khilchipura gram panchayat received Vinod's request for the EPIC information, its members informed his mother, who immediately approached the Nai Abadi police station in Mandsaur, reporting that her son, missing for over two decades, might still be alive. Police verified the details through the panchayat and traced Vinod to Nagaur, Rajasthan. A police team was dispatched, and Vinod was brought back to his native village, leading to an emotional reunion between mother and son after 22 years. Vinod expressed happiness at returning to his village and meeting his family again, while his relatives said the family had believed him dead for years and never imagined that a voter verification exercise would bring him back. "I am very happy. I have come back to my village after 22 years. I left in 2003, and today I have found my entire family," Vinod said, struggling to hold back tears.

Mandsaur Additional Superintendent of Police TS Baghel said Vinod had left home without informing anyone, and that his attempt to update his voter identity under the SIR process triggered the chain of events that led to his tracing. According to police, Vinod is now settled in Rajasthan and plans to take his mother and elder brother to live with him. "Vinod had left home without informing anyone. During the SIR process, he needed EPIC details, which led the panchayat to contact his parents. The police followed up, verified his identity and located him. He is now married and has two children," Baghel said.

Around the same time, the same SIR process played an entirely different role in Indore, where it indirectly led to the arrest of a notorious inter-state criminal. Abdul Rashid, also known as Talwar Singh, a 54-year-old accused in around 100 cases including theft, burglary, robbery, murder and attempted murder across Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and other states, returned to Indore after many years to fill up his SIR enumeration form. After completing the process, he allegedly committed a burglary in the Geeta Nagar locality on December 3, breaking into a locked flat and stealing gold and silver jewellery worth several lakh rupees.

Indore's Palasia police tracked him down following a tip-off and arrested him within days. During questioning, Rashid's extensive criminal history came to light, including a case in Maharashtra's Wardha district where he allegedly beheaded a man with a sword and surrendered at a police station with the severed head, which earned him the alias "Talwar Singh." Police recovered stolen property worth over Rs 7.5 lakh from his possession, including jewellery, cash and a two-wheeler. Senior police officers said that had Rashid not returned to Indore for the SIR process and then committed the burglary, it might not have been possible to arrest him.

"He is extremely cunning and has over 100 criminal cases registered across states. Had he not come to Indore for the SIR process and then committed the burglary, perhaps we would not have been able to arrest him," said Rajesh Vyas, DCP Indore.

The two cases have unfolded against the backdrop of a massive revision of the electoral rolls in Madhya Pradesh. According to official data, 42.74 lakh names have been removed from the state's voter list so far under the SIR exercise, while 8.40 lakh names are yet to be mapped. Of the names removed, 19.19 lakh belong to men and 23.64 lakh to women. The total number of voters in the state has dropped from 5.74 crore to 5.31 crore, meaning roughly every 13th voter has been deleted in the ongoing process.

While the SIR drive was designed primarily to improve the accuracy of electoral records, these two cases illustrate how a bureaucratic exercise can unexpectedly reshape human destinies, reuniting families separated by decades on one hand and bringing long-evading criminals to justice on the other.