A 68-year-old security guard at a residential building in New Town is running from one government office to another, travelling for hours in an effort to reclaim his family’s voting rights.

The names of Biswanath Dhali, from Srirampur village under the Swarupnagar constituency in North 24-Parganas, along with those of his wife Shikharani and two sons, Barun and Rajesh, were deleted from the post-SIR electoral rolls published on February 28. In their village alone, at least 50 voters have been struck off the rolls.

“I work as a security guard while my sons drive cars. It is very difficult for us to keep running from one place to another to submit forms and documents. At each place, it takes several hours,” Biswanath said.

“Why should we have to go through this harassment when we are legitimate voters who have cast votes several times?”

The ordeal

On March 2, Biswanath and around 50 others from his village went to the district magistrate’s office in Barasat. The district magistrate is also the district election officer (DEO) for the polls.

“The booth-level officer (BLO) in our village told us to submit appeals to the DEO. So we wrote applications on plain paper and went to submit them,” Biswanath said. “There was a long queue, and we stood from noon to 5pm to submit the appeals.”

They received no response. A few days later, Biswanath contacted the BLO again. “This time, he asked us to fill out Form 6 meant for new voters,” he said. “We submitted the forms and waited. After a few days, we were called for a hearing.”

On April 4, Biswanath and others travelled nearly three hours to the Swarupnagar block development officer’s (BDO) office for the hearing. “We stood in a queue for more than two hours and were asked to submit documents. We provided Aadhaar and PAN cards along with property papers,” he said.

On April 9, they received messages stating that their applications had been rejected.

“I felt completely helpless. Then someone told me about a person who was helping those whose names had been deleted. We went to his house in Dum Dum, and he asked us to fill out Form 6 again,” Biswanath said.

However, when he informed the BLO, he was told that Form 6 should not have been submitted. “The same BLO had earlier asked us to fill Form 6,” he said.

The BLO then advised them to file an online appeal to restore their names to the voter rolls.

On Sunday, April 20, Biswanath again travelled to Swarupnagar to hand over documents to the BLO, who promised to file the appeals.

The anxiety

Biswanath fears the consequences of losing voter status. He worries his bank account could be frozen and that essential benefits may be disrupted, including rations and pension schemes provided by the Bengal government.

“I earn ₹6,000 a month and live with my wife and two grandchildren. They are my elder son’s children, and their mother has died,” he said. “If our free ration stops because we don’t have voter cards, how will we survive?”

He is equally concerned about his old-age pension. “We receive Briddha Bhata. Can that also stop?” he asked.