Bengal SIR: EC suspends 7 officials over 'misconduct', 'misuse of power' during voter list revision
The process of hearing cases related to 'logical discrepancies' in West Bengal’s voter list has been completed, a senior official of the Election Commission said on Saturday. With the hearings now over, the poll body will publish the final electoral rolls on February 28.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has suspended seven officials in West Bengal and directed the Chief Secretary to initiate disciplinary proceedings against them. According to the Commission, cited by ANI, the action has been taken for "serious misconduct, dereliction of duty and misuse of statutory powers in connection with the Special Intensive Revision."
The officials who have been suspended are:
- Sefaur Rahaman, Assistant Director of Agriculture Department and AERO for 56-Samserganj Assembly Constituency, District Murshidabad.
- Nitish Das, Revenue Officer, Farakka, and AERO for 55-Farakka Assembly Constituency.
- Dalia Ray Choudhury, Women Development Officer, Maynaguri Development Block, and AERO for 16-Maynaguri Assembly Constituency.
- Murshid Alam, ADA, Suti Block, and AERO for 57-Suti Assembly Constituency.
- Satyajit Das, Joint BDO and AERO for 139-Canning Purbo Assembly Constituency.
- Joydeep Kundu, FEO and AERO for 139-Canning Purbo Assembly Constituency.
- Debashis Biswas, Joint BDO and AERO for 229-Debra Assembly Constituency.
SIR hearings conclude
The process of hearing cases related to “logical discrepancies” in West Bengal’s voter list has been completed, a senior official of the Election Commission said on Saturday. With the hearings now over, the poll body will publish the final electoral rolls on February 28.
The hearings were part of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise. They began on December 27 and were held at camps arranged in schools, club premises and various government buildings across the state. These sessions dealt with cases involving missing names and spelling errors in the draft electoral rolls.
Officials will continue checking submitted documents until February 21. Any remaining information with Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs) must be uploaded by Monday, the official added.
During the door-to-door enumeration drive, nearly 58 lakh names were identified for removal. These included voters who were reported dead, listed more than once, or had shifted their residence. As a result, their names were left out of the draft rolls published in December.
Although the final rolls were earlier scheduled to be released on February 14, the Election Commission later extended the deadline to February 28. The official did not provide the exact number of names that will be deleted in the final list. However, he said that most of the people marked for removal did not attend the hearings despite receiving repeated notices.