The Election Commission on Sunday night suspended seven assistant electoral registration officers from six Assembly segments in Bengal after holding them guilty of including several ineligible persons in the post-SIR draft electoral rolls.

Sources said this was the first time the EC had suspended poll-duty officials directly in Bengal instead of recommending such punitive action to the state government. Poll panel sources said the revelation that some AEROs had allowed ineligible names on the rolls had hung a cloud on the publication of the final rolls on February 28.

The seven AEROs — two from Canning Purbo in South 24-Parganas and one each from Suti, Samserganj and Farakka in Murshidabad, Moynaguri in Jalpaiguri and Debra in West Midnapore — have been suspended with immediate effect.

The poll panel has also asked Bengal chief secretary Nandini Chakravorty to ensure that departmental proceedings are initiated against the officials immediately.

“It was found during a random review of cases approved for inclusion in the final rolls that these officers had given their nod to several applicants despite insufficient and ineligible documents. These officers failed to take corrective actions even though the roll observers pointed out the mistakes. The EC had to initiate action against them to ensure the publication of error-free rolls,” said a poll panel official.

The sources in the poll panel said several other officers were under the scanner as there were complaints that ineligible individuals were being approved for inclusion in the final rolls.

“The EC had made it clear during a videoconference with district election officers that all such cases should be taken off the system by Monday. If such cases continue to be on the database after Monday, more officers will face stringent action,” a source said.

Another official said the way bogus cases were being found in the system after approval from EROs and AEROs, it might take a long time to clean up the mess, more so because the officials were “not cooperating” with the EC.

“The EC will not publish the final rolls until it is 100 per cent sure that there are no ineligible voters. If the bogus cases are not taken off immediately from the system, the publication of the final rolls might have to be deferred,” said a bureaucrat.

Sources in Nabanna said the suspensions could lead to another round of conflict between the state government and the EC.

“Usually, the EC asks the state to take action against officers. It is unusual for the EC to suspend officers directly,” a senior Nabanna official said.

An official in the EC said that as the state had dragged its feet on taking action on four errant EROs and AEROs earlier, the poll panel did not want to involve the government this time.