The SIR in Bengal was carried out along with 8 states and 3 Union Territories. But here, the central government sent thousands of micro-observers, whose job was to review the decisions made by Electoral Registration Officers (EROs). According to the law, electoral rolls are the responsibility of EROs. So why were thousands of micro-observers deployed over and above them? Why wasn’t this done in other states Why only in Bengal?
But this was just the beginning.
In every state, names of voters were removed if they were either deceased or had moved elsewhere. This happened in Bengal as well. But in Bengal, a new category was created for removing voters: ‘Logical Discrepancy.’ Under this, 27 lakh voters were removed. Most of them were alive and had Aadhaar and other documents, yet they were removed from the voter list.
These 27 lakh voters were categorised as ‘under adjudication,’ and they were told to go to a tribunal. But the clearance of cases is taking place at a very slow pace at the tribunal and it is unlikely that even one percent of the ‘under adjudication’ voters were restored. Sadly, even the Supreme Court didn’t seem concerned about lakhs of voters being deprived of their franchise in this election.
Also, it turned out that Muslims form a majority among the voters who are under adjudication. Isn’t this disproportionate targeting of voters known to be non-BJP?
