Mamata Banerjee writes to CEC, urges him to halt SIR of voter rolls

Upping the ante on SIR West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote a strongly worded letter to CEC Gyanesh Kumar on Thursday asking him to immediately halt the exercise that she claimed was chaotic coercive and dangerousBanerjee mentioned that she has time and again raised concerns over the ongoing Special Intensive Revision SIR of the electoral rolls in the state and is now compelled to write to the chief election commissioner because the situation has reached a deeply alarming stageShe alleged that the SIR in Bengal is being carried out in an unplanned dangerous manner that has crippled the process from day oneThe chief minister accused the Election Commission of thrusting the SIR upon officials and citizens without basic preparedness adequate planning or clear communication claiming that critical gaps in training confusion over mandatory documents and the nearimpossibility of BLOs meeting voters during working hours had rendered the entire exercise structurally unsoundShe urged the CEC to intervene decisively to halt the ongoing exercise stop coercive measures provide proper training and support and thoroughly reassess the present methodology and timelinesIf this path is not corrected without delay the consequences for the system the officials and the citizens will be irreversible she wrote calling this a moment that demands responsibility humanity and decisive corrective actionThe threepage letter among her strongest yet painted a grim portrait of boothlevel officers stretched far beyond human limitsThey are expected to manage their principal duties many being teachers and frontline workers while simultaneously conducting doortodoor surveys and handling complex esubmissions she wrote adding that most were struggling with online forms due to lack of training server failures and repeated data mismatchesThe consequence she warned is a looming breakdownAt this pace it is almost certain that by December 4 voter data across multiple constituencies cannot be uploaded with required accuracy Banerjee saidUnder extreme pressure and fear of punitive action many BLOs were being pushed into filing incorrect or incomplete entries risking disenfranchisement of genuine voters and eroding the integrity of the electoral rollBanerjee reserved some of her sharpest criticism for what she described as the Election Commissions indefensible response not support but intimidationShe alleged that the Office of the CEO West Bengal was issuing showcause notices without justification threatening already strained BLOs with disciplinary action instead of acknowledging the reality on the groundCompounding the strain Banerjee wrote was the timing of the SIR Bengal is at the peak of paddy harvest and in the middle of Rabi sowing a strictly timebound window especially for potato cultivation she saidMillions of farmers and labourers are engaged in essential agricultural work and cannot be expected to abandon the fields to participate in SIR enumeration she saidBut it was the human cost that Banerjee described as now unbearableShe cited the suicide of an anganwadi worker serving as a BLO in Jalpaiguri districts Mal area reportedly under crushing SIRrelated pressure adding that several others have lost their lives since this process beganA voter roll revision that earlier took three years she said had been forcibly compressed into three months creating inhuman working conditions and a climate of fear and uncertaintyThe chief minister warned that continuing with the unplanned coercive drive would not only endanger more lives but also jeopardise the legitimacy of the electoral revision itselfThe Election Commission is yet to respond to the chief ministers latest salvo even as the political temperature around the SIR once a routine administrative exercise continues to climb amid charges of overreach coercion and chaosThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever