A school teacher working as a Block Level Officer (BLO) in Gujarat’s Kheda district died of a heart attack, with his family attributing his death to "excessive work pressure" linked to the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
At least five BLOs have died in West Bengal, Kerala and Rajasthan this month, allegedly due to suicide or heart attack.
The BLO, Rameshbhai Parmar (50), a resident of Jambudi village in Kapadvanj taluka of the district, died of a heart attack in his sleep at his home during the intervening night of Wednesday and Thursday, his brother Narendra Parmar told reporters.
Rameshbhai Parmar, who taught at a government school in Navapura village in Kapadvanj, was recently given the duty of BLO, he said.
"After finishing his work as a BLO, he returned home around 7.30 pm on Wednesday and once again started doing paperwork after freshening up. Since there is an issue with the mobile network in his village, he came to my house to finish his work. He worked till 11.30 pm and returned to his house," according to him.
"He then went to sleep after having dinner. But when he did not wake up in the morning, we took him to a nearby hospital, where doctors declared him dead. We believe that he suffered a heart attack due to excessive work pressure," the brother of the deceased added.
Parmar's daughter Shilpa echoed the same sentiments as she alleged that his father was "under pressure" due to BLO-related work.
District Collector Amit Prakash Yadav and District Primary Education Officer Paresh Vaghela were not available for comments despite repeated attempts to call them.
In the wake of the series of back-to-back BLO deaths, the Congress reacted with a post on X, asking who was accountable.
A growing number of BLOs are raising the issue of excessive workload during the ongoing SIR exercise. With the deaths of BLOs in three states, scrutiny of the process has now intensified. Questions are being raised about institutional accountability.
On Wednesday, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee wrote on X that an Anganwadi worker and tribal woman, Shanti Muni Ekka, “took her own life under the unbearable pressure of the ongoing SIR work”. She said that 28 lives, in total, had been lost since the SIR began. “Some due to fear and uncertainty, others due to stress and overload.”
Last month, the Election Commission of India ordered SIR for Chhattisgarh, Goa, Gujarat, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Puducherry, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and Lakshadweep. The poll body on Monday ordered 'Special Revision' of the electoral rolls in Assam.
SIR was conducted in Bihar before the state went to the polls earlier this month.
