Chanpa Dawn has lost count of how many elections she has voted in, but the 88-year-old widow from East Burdwan is unsure whether she would be able to vote in future.
Chanpa married young into an affluent farmer’s family at Hitta village in Galsi, but her husband’s job took her to Delhi. Till she finally returned to the village in 2002, she divided her time between Delhi and Hitta.
Twenty-three years on, that change of address has become a problem for her with the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls under way in Bengal.
The year she and her husband — who passed about a decade ago — moved from Delhi to Bengal, an SIR was carried out in both places. But the couple’s names do not figure on the post-SIR 2002 rolls of either Bengal or Delhi.
“I searched the (2002) electoral rolls of both Bengal and Delhi but could not trace them,” said Mangaldeep Samanta, a 29-year-old Trinamool leader in Galsi Block II who has been helping people locate their names on the 2002 rolls so they can fill in their enumeration forms.
“My grandmother is 80-plus. She was born in this country and has lived all her life in Delhi and Bengal,” Chanpa’s grandson and farmer Akash Dawn, 31, told The Telegraph in Kishorkana, a village in Galsi that lies on the way to Hitta.
“How can the Election Commission expect her to produce any of the 11 documents required to prove that she is an eligible voter? Have you seen the elitist list of documents the EC wants citizens to furnish? My grandmother has none of those,” he said.
“Now, think about the poor and marginalised people who do not have their names on the 2002 voters’ list. How do people like my grandmother protect their constitutional right to vote? The EC must answer.”
The anxiety and harassment his grandmother and many other villagers are facing because of their lack of documents has made Akash resentful of the SIR.
“I have heard from village elders that the exercise in 2002 was not so complicated. Forms were not required to be filled in or documents to be furnished,” he said.
“I am not against the SIR, but why this harassment of bona fide citizens? If the Narendra Modi government wants to flush out infiltrators, the census should have been the option. I too want infiltrators out, but the (SIR) process is proving a pain for genuine Indians, too.”
Local Trinamool leader Sabiruddin Ahmed Joy agreed with the sentiment.
“People are responding to the SIR. But while drawing up the list of required documents, the EC should have kept in mind the harsh ground reality,” he said.
“A large number of underprivileged people are illiterate, many live in temporary settlements — you can’t expect them to whip out documents readily. The EC is out of sync with the ground reality.
“Passports, pension payment orders and birth certificates are among the documents that voters need to furnish if they or their parents don’t figure on the 2002 rolls. Isn’t this list blatantly elitist? The farmers are trying their best to cooperate but the fear of being disenfranchised persists.”
Around 45km away in the Memari area of East Burdwan, marginal farmer Abdul Mannan, who has been helping people fill in their forms, echoed Sabiruddin.
“Although there’s no major resistance against the SIR, for those who do not have the required documents, the fear is real,” Mannan said.
“I have my name on the 2002 list but many of those I have helped with the enumeration process do not. These tillers of the soil now fear losing their voting rights.
“A voter identity card has more uses than giving a citizen the right to vote. We need it to sell our produce in the Kisan Mandi or secure farm loans. There’s anxiety bubbling under the surface now. The real picture will emerge once the draft electoral rolls are published in early December.”
Mannan said the SIR process had left women the most vulnerable.
“Land rights are usually with the male members of the family. Women are weak in terms of documents. The poorer they are, the more disadvantaged they are,” he added.
A sense of uncertainty has stunned into silence Hindu refugees from Bangladesh at several colonies in Memari. Many of them are farmers, while a sizeable number work in the unorganised sector.
These refugees refused to speak to this correspondent, afraid that the disclosure of their identities might land them in trouble.
“The SIR has made them apprehensive about what lies next. The anxiety is deeper among those who crossed over into India in the last decade or so and moved into colonies such as Palla Camp, Maheshdanga and Merua, where they had relatives,” said CPM leader Krishanu Bhadra, who works among these families in Memari.
“They are weak in the matter of documents. The BJP’s loud assurances about the CAA are not cutting much ice here. The fear of being marked out as Bangladeshi is keeping them awake at night. Mind you, they are all Hindus.”
Sanat Banerjee, another CPM leader, said the SIR was not much of an issue with the well-to-do farmers as they had their documents in order.
Chnapa Dawn stands with her daughter-in-law Sutapa Dawn outside their home in East Burdwan’s Galsi on Thursday. Picture by Joyjit Ghosh
“It’s the farm labourers, sharecroppers and those engaged in the unorganised farm sector who are at the risk of being disenfranchised,”
he said.
“We have approached the Election Commission to address the issues of the poor and document-less people.”
Some 50km away in Singur, Hooghly, 72-year-old Balaram Das stood on a huge stack of paddy, arranging bundles that his 30-year-old son Santu Kumar Das kept throwing at him.
Asked to reflect on the SIR, the resident of Purba Para village in Beraberi, who wore a red T-shirt, paused, dropped a bundle at his feet and said: “Albaat SIR proyojon achhe (The SIR is absolutely a must).”
But he had a word of caution that the state BJP might find unpalatable.
“The EC should ensure that all outsiders staying illegally in India are thrown out,” Balaram said.
“Religion should not determine who stays and who goes. (Being) Illegal outsiders should be the only consideration, nothing else.”
Santu picked up from where his father had left off.
“The BJP is saying that Muslims from Bangladesh (alone) should be sent back to their country. No, this defeats the purpose of the SIR,”
he said.
“Look at what is unfolding at the Hakimpur border in North 24-Parganas. Not just Muslims from Bangladesh, a lot of Bangladeshi Hindus are also crossing over. The SIR should look at that, too.”