KOLKATA — West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday vowed to gherao the Election Commission’s office in Delhi if the name of a single legitimate voter is deleted from the final electoral roll after the completion of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in the state.
Addressing a rally in Bankura district, Banerjee said people of the state were being “tortured” in the name of SIR.
“Around 60 people have died due to SIR. Elderly people are being called for document verification hearings,” she said.
“If even a single legitimate voter’s name is deleted, the TMC will gherao the office of the Election Commission in Delhi,” she asserted.
Calling the SIR a huge “scam” being conducted with the help of artificial intelligence (AI), Banerjee said that the people of the state would not tolerate such “harassment.”
“People will not allow BJP to come to power in West Bengal,” she stated.
The CM also slammed the BJP for alleged attacks against Bengali migrant workers in the states ruled by the party.
Banerjee said that while the BJP promises to build a “sonar Bangla” whenever elections approach, in reality, people who speak Bengali are beaten up in states where it rules.
More than 58 lakh voters were deleted from the draft rolls published on December 16, after the initial phase of SIR in the state. Out of the 7.6 crore total voters, the EC has also raised speculation regarding the “genuineness” of about 1.66 crore voters, who have been called for hearing to verify their documents again.
In a letter to the West Bengal CEO, the WBCS (Executive) Officers’ Association has raised objections to what it termed “suo-motu system-driven deletion” of voters in the draft electoral rolls, bypassing the statutory role of electoral registration officers (ERO).
The act of “system-driven deletion of so many electors, all at once, appears to infringe upon the natural rights of electors who might well be otherwise eligible under existing provisions of the law, yet for some reasons or other, could not be present during the enumeration process,” the letter said. — With inputs from PTI
