Sources added that the Calcutta High Court has been monitoring the case regarding 60 lakh voters marked as ‘under trial’ in West Bengal after the Special Intensive Review (SIR) of electoral rolls in the state.
“The list of information regarding the number of eligible and ineligible voters comes from the Supreme Court. We will follow the court’s directions,” said a senior official of the state CEO’s office.
“The big SIR exercise is very vague and goes against the ethos of liberal democracy. Initially, it was designed as a routine electoral process of reshuffling electoral rolls with genuine voters, but eventually the drive has become exclusionary, insensitive and dangerous to Dalits and minorities.” This process said that the poor image of the institution is profiling and transparent of the Commission. Matin of the department of International Relations, Jadavpur University.
The ECI on February 28 had released the final post-SIR electoral rolls in West Bengal, deleting about 64 lakh absent, displaced, dead and duplicate (ASDD) voters and categorizing another 60 lakh under ‘logical mismatch’ and ‘unmapped’ groups.
Following the Supreme Court’s directions, 60 million voters belonging to the two categories were marked as ‘under trial’, awaiting approval by a team of more than 700 judicial officers who scrutinized their documents under the Supreme Court’s monitoring.
The ECI on Friday set up 19 appellate tribunals to hear appeals against orders passed by judicial officers currently deciding the eligibility of 60.06 lakh voters excluded from the final list released after the Special Intensive Review of electoral rolls in West Bengal.
Questions have been raised about whether the review of the more than 60 million voters under trial and the subsequent appeals process will be completed before the state goes to the polls on April 23 and 29.
