Hearing notices to voters to be sent from today

Kolkata: Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) will begin issuing hearing notices to voters from Thursday, with hearings scheduled to commence after a gap of seven days.

In the first phase, around 32 lakh “unmapped” voters—whose details do not match records from the 2002 SIR but whose names appear in the draft electoral rolls—will be called for hearings.

There are 294 EROs in the state, one for each Assembly Constituency.

“This clearly establishes that inclusion of a name in the draft electoral roll does not mean an elector will not be called for hearing,” an official of the Bengal Chief Electoral Officer’s (CEO) office said.

Each notice will be issued in two copies—one to be handed to the elector and the other to be retained by the concerned BLO after obtaining the voter’s signature. Hearings will be conducted at offices like the District Electoral Officer, Block Development Officer or Sub-Divisional Officer.

According to sources, the state CEO has proposed to the Election Commission that hearings for electors aged above 85 years be conducted at their residences. It has also been suggested that concerned BLOs be allowed to remain present during the hearings.

Officials said there are over 1.69 crore electors with logical discrepancies whose names are currently under scrutiny.

During the hearing, electors will be required to submit documents to establish Indian citizenship and voter eligibility. Eleven categories of documents will be accepted, including identity cards of state or central government employees or pensioners; documents issued by post offices, banks, LIC or local authorities prior to 1987, etc.

The process of notice will continue until February 7, 2026, and the final electoral roll is scheduled to be published on February 14.