Mamata Banerjee on Monday upped the ante against the Election Commission, questioning the Bengal chief electoral officer’s proposal to appoint 1,000 data entry operators for the SIR and the poll panel’s plan to set up polling stations at private housing complexes.
In a letter to chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, Mamata expressed “serious concerns” at an order from the office of Bengal CEO Manoj Kumar Agarwal not to involve the state’s own contractual data entry operators or Bangla Sahayata Kendra (BSK) staff in any SIR-related work. The BSKs are online platforms that help people access government services.
“It has recently come to light that the CEO, West Bengal, has directed district election officers (DEOs) not to engage contractual data entry operators and Bangla Sahayata Kendra (BSK) staff for SIR-related or other election-related data work,” the chief minister’s letter says.
“Simultaneously, the CEO’s office has floated a Request for Proposal (RfP) for hiring 1,000 Data entry Operators and 50 Software Developers for a period of one year.… This raises serious concerns.”
The issue of data entry has become sensitive during the SIR following workload complaints — and two reported suicides — by booth-level officers (BLOs), many of whom say they are struggling to upload the enumeration form data online.
Mamata wrote to Kumar that district offices in Bengal already had many competent professionals undertaking “such functions” (data entry). Besides, she underlined, the field officers (district magistrates) hired additional data entry personnel on contract whenever necessary.
“Why, then, is the CEO’s office assuming this role on behalf of field officers?... Is this exercise being undertaken at the behest of a political party to serve vested interests?” Banerjee asked.
CEO Agarwal said at an evening news conference that the the poll panel had decided against engaging the state’s contractual data entry operators way before theSIR started.
“During the SIR, we got in touch with the EC (Election Commission) and wanted to know how the BLOs could be assisted with data entry work,” he said.
“The EC informed us that in Bihar, several data entry operators were engaged for this purpose, and we can follow the same path. Only then a tender was floated, and it was sent to the (state) finance department for final approval.”
Commission sources said the poll panel had reservations about the data entry operators already working with the state government.
They said some of these operators had been found to have inserted fictitious names into the voter lists of at least four Assembly segments prior to the SIR.
“This is why permanent government employees from the Group C category and above were asked to do the data entry work,” asource said.
But once the SIR began, he said, it became clear that more data entry operators were needed. “It was found that many of the BLOs needed assistance in uploading data to the BLO app. This is when the tender was floated.”
The source added that the CEO’s office had not recruited anybody yet.
Mamata wrote that establishing polling stations within private housing complexes was problematic. She underlined that polling stations were always set up in government or semi-government institutions to ensure accessibility and neutrality.
Agarwal said he had nothing to do with a policy framed by the commission.
Sources in the poll panel said the policy had helped increase the turnout during this year’s DelhiAssembly elections.
“Polling stations within the housing complexes helped increase the voter turnout by 8 to 10 per cent, so the commission is considering implementing it in other states too,” a source said.
The BJP attacked Mamata saying the state’s contractual data entry operators and BSK staff had been engaged by a private agency that meddled in administrativedecisions.
“So before pointing fingers, please make public the process you used to select DEOs (data entry operators) and BSK operators,” the BJP’s IT cell chief and co-minder in Bengal, Amit Malviya, posted on X.
He underscored that any premises could be designated as a polling station as long as they ensured the ease of voting for all voters.
“Similar booths have been set up in high-rise buildings in Delhi and elsewhere,”he wrote.
Malviya ended his post with a query for Mamata: “So do explain: What exactly is upsetting you — the increase in voting, or the collapse of the narrative you’re tryingto build?”