Bengal CEO says ready for the special voter roll revision if the EC directs

Kolkata: Bengal Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Kumar Agarwal reiterated on Saturday that the decision to conduct a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in Bengal lies solely with the Election Commission, and the CEO office is prepared to do the needful if such a directive is issued. The CEO office on Saturday conducted a major training programme for 970 participants in Kolkata that included Assistant Electoral Registration Officer (AEROs), Supervisors and Booth Level Officers (BLOs) from six electoral districts — Howrah, Kolkata South, Kolkata North, South 24-Parganas, North 24-Parganas, and Nadia that comes under the Presidency division. 108 Assembly constituencies of the state come under the Presidency range.

“If SIR takes place, the training will equip BLOs to carry out their responsibilities effectively. However, the decision rests entirely with the ECI. SIR may take place in the future. BLO training is a regular activity of the Commission, and SIR, like many other aspects, is in our training syllabus,” said Agarwal. He added that SIR is nothing new and it has happened on earlier occasions too, during the period 1952 to 2004. He also defended the mention of SIR and its operational details in the training guidebook, stating that the guide strictly follows ECI norms and procedures. Participants, including BLOs, AEROs, and Supervisors, echoed this sentiment, noting that they will comply with any official instructions provided to them. As of now, they have not received any clear directives specifically regarding the implementation of SIR in the state. Currently, there are around 81,000 BLOs in the state.

The BLO training took place in Malda on Thursday and East Burdwan on Friday. On Sunday, a similar session will be held in Midnapore, while on Monday, Jalpaiguri in north Bengal, will see training session. The Trinamool Congress made it clear that it will oppose SIR in Bengal tooth and nail, if implemented in the state. Sagarika Ghose, TMC Rajya Sabha MP, termed the exercise as a conspiracy by the BJP through the EC to disfranchise lakhs of Bengal voters in the backdrop of the saffron party losing back-to-back parliamentary elections in Bengal – 2019 and 2024. “The SIR’s focus is exclusion, not inclusion. EC has to answer whether it is trying to clean up the electoral rolls or trying to create a citizenship register. Establishing a citizenship register is not the job of EC, and it is mandated to clean up electoral rolls. It has been screaming for Aadhaar as citizenship proof for the last few years and now suddenly it is saying Aadhaar is no longer an adequate proof of citizenship. There is vast empirical evidence that migrant workers who go here and there for work are finding it difficult to furnish the documents that the EC is demanding, and so it is an exercise to disenfranchise the poorest, which is against the basic structure of the Constitution, as it is denying the right to vote,” she added. Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari on Saturday claimed that there are 1.25 crore illegal immigrants in the voters’ list of West Bengal, and all of them will be sent back following a SIR of the rolls. The EC, having conducted SIR exercise in Bihar, has stated that 22 lakh names have been marked as deceased, 7 lakh voters were found registered in more than one place, and around 35 lakh people are either untraceable or had permanently moved away. About 1.2 lakh forms are still awaited.