The Trinamool Congress on Wednesday shared a photo of a purported residential certificate issued by the Bihar government in the name of a “Sonalika Tractor”.
The incident comes days after Opposition parties furnished a similar residential certificate issued to a dog. The Election Commission on Wednesday denied any such dog papers had been filed.
The Trinamool alleged that documents like these are being treated as valid during the Election Commission of India’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar, which the national Opposition has dubbed an exercise to disenfranchise millions of poor people who may not have the documents the poll panel treats as valid.
The document of Sonalika Taractor carried a photo of a woman, with the father's name listed as “Sawraj Taractor” and the mother’s name as “Car Devi.”
The Telegraph Online could not independently verify the document’s authenticity. The Trinamool did not say from where it had found the documents.
“First a dog, now a tractor. Both have been issued residential certificates by the Bihar Government,” the Trinamool alleged in a post on its official X (formerly Twitter) handle.
“These very certificates are being accepted as valid proof in @ECISVEEP’s Special Intensive Revision exercise, which has already arbitrarily deleted the names of millions of poor and vulnerable citizens from the voter list.
“What began as bureaucratic comedy has turned into an assault on democracy. A tractor gets voting rights. A legitimate citizen doesn’t. This is a mockery of electoral integrity,” the party alleged.
Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha deputy leader Sagarika Ghose called the Election Commission of India’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise a crucial issue that needs urgent discussion in Parliament.
“Opposition parties have participated honestly in the debate on the Pahalgam attack... but the most important issue today is SIR,” she told PTI. “We’ve been submitting notices continuously, but none are being accepted.”
“We’ve seen lakhs of voters being removed from the rolls in Bihar. We want to know—is citizens’ right to vote being taken away? Is the BJP using the EC to push its agenda?” Ghose asked.
She also alleged that while the revision is underway in Bihar, the real political target is West Bengal.
“This is dangerous for the basic structure of our democracy... If we’re denied a debate, we’ll still raise this issue strongly in Parliament,” she said.
The Election Commission on Wednesday denied any dog papers had been submitted.
“The vote of every citizen is important,” the poll panel wrote on its social media handle.
“No voter of Bihar has submitted such a document to the Election Commission.”
Opposition parties have been demanding a discussion on the SIR issue, staging protests in both Houses and within the Parliament complex, calling for the immediate halt of the revision exercise.
