The Election Commission of India on Sunday stated that identical serial numbers of electors’ photo identity cards (EPIC) in two states did not imply fake voters, which led Bengal’s ruling Trinamul Congress to claim that the poll panel was engaging in a damage-control exercise after Mamata Banerjee exposed the “conspiracy” hatched in collusion with the BJP.

“Mamata Banerjee’s @MamataOfficial allegations have been proven to be true. Now the ECI is going into damage control after the conspiracy was exposed,” Trinamul state general secretary Kunal Ghosh wrote on X soon after the EC issued the press release with the clarification.

“...There is no good answer to how this happened. When everything got leaked, the commission said it would take some steps. But we will not believe/rely on their words,” he added, claiming that the party’s drive to scrutinise the electoral roll across Bengal will continue to ferret out ‘ghost’ voters.

During her party’s extended state conference at Netaji Indoor Stadium on Thursday, Mamata flagged the issue of identical EPIC numbers, alleging that the BJP had conspired with the EC to manipulate elections in Bengal using fake voters. She also claimed that the BJP had secured victories in Haryana and Delhi using the same strategy, which the Opposition parties in those states had failed to recognise.

Following Mamata’s directive for party members to scrutinise the voter list, the issue snowballed into an urgent political matter for the BJP, which accused the ruling Trinamool Congress of injecting “ghost” voters into the electoral roll over a
long period.

Mamata has formed an extended committee, headed by state president Subrata Bakshi, to review the electoral roll and identify “ghost” voters. The committee is scheduled to meet on March 6 at the party headquarters here to discuss its plan of action.

Amid the controversy and allegations against the EC, the panel on Sunday issued a press release stating that duplication in EPIC numbers does not indicate fake voters. The EC has clarified that no person can vote outside their registered constituency and polling booth. It also assured that necessary steps would be taken to ensure that all registered electors receive unique EPIC numbers.

Samirul Islam, a Trinamul Rajya Sabha member, demanded that the panel disclose the total number of duplications in EPIC numbers across the country.

“If our chief minister had not exposed their conspiracy, they would have continued with their plan to benefit the BJP. We want to know the exact number of such duplications — whether they are in thousands, lakhs or crores,” said Islam, who is a member of Mamata’s voter list scrutiny committee.

BJP leaders, however, said that the EC had clarified that the TMC’s claims of fake voters had no basis.

“It is a ploy by the TMC to remove the names of Hindu voters, non-Bengali voters, and linguistic minorities from the state’s electoral roll. That is why they are spreading falsehoods about voter list manipulation,” said the BJP’s chief spokesperson for Bengal Samik Bhattacharya.