Trinamool Congress MP and national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee on Sunday stepped up his attack on the Election Commission over the post-SIR electoral rolls in West Bengal, alleging that the “target of deleting over one crore voters was decided even before the exercise began”.
Speaking at a press conference a day after the first phase of post-SIR final rolls was published, Abhishek said BJP leaders had publicly stated that “1.2 crore names” would be removed from the voters’ list.
He claimed the combined number of deletions and voters placed “under adjudication” now closely matches that figure.
“The target of deleting over one crore voters in West Bengal was decided even before SIR commenced. BJP leaders have repeatedly said 1.2 crore names will be removed. If you add the deletions and those put under adjudication, the number corresponds closely to the figure of 1.2 crore,” he said.
Abhishek referred to earlier statements made by Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, former BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar and Union minister Shantanu Thakur, who had spoken about large-scale deletions from the electoral rolls.
“Even before the commencement of SIR, these leaders had said that 1 crore to 1.25 crore voters will be deleted. They had fixed a target. The Election Commission is acting accordingly,” he alleged.
The Trinamool leader said the BJP was unable to win elections politically and was therefore trying to “influence the poll result by deleting genuine voters by using the Election Commission”.
“However, deleting genuine voters won’t yield any result for the BJP. They will not win more than 50 in the assembly polls,” Abhishek said.
He also announced that chief minister Mamata Banerjee will sit on a dharna on March 6 against what he described as “arbitrary deletions” under the Special Intensive Revision.
Abhishek’s remarks came a day after the Election Commission published the post-SIR rolls, months ahead of the assembly elections.
According to official data released on Saturday, 63.66 lakh names, about 8.3 per cent of the electorate, have been deleted since the Special Intensive Revision began in November last year.
The total number of voters has come down from 7.66 crore to just over 7.04 crore.
The 116-day exercise, the first intensive revision since 2002, has also placed over 60.06 lakh electors in the “under adjudication” category, with their eligibility now subject to legal scrutiny in the coming weeks.
The draft rolls published on December 16 last year had already reduced the electorate from 7.66 crore to 7.08 crore, deleting over 58 lakh names on grounds such as death, migration, duplication and untraceability.
After claims and objections were heard, another 5.46 lakh deletions were recorded through Form-7 applications, taking the total number of SIR-linked deletions to around 63.66 lakh.
