Bengal misses SIR deadline again; 22 lakh enumeration forms still undistributed

West Bengal has missed the revised deadline for the distribution of enumeration forms — the first stage of the three-phase Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls — with 22 lakh forms still pending.

According to data from the office of the chief electoral officer (CEO), the state had distributed 7.45 crore enumeration forms by 6 pm on Friday, covering roughly 97 per cent of the 7.66 crore electors listed as of 27 October.

The distribution was initially supposed to be completed by 11 November, but around 15 per cent of electors had not received the forms by then. The deadline was then extended to 14 November, which has now passed with lakhs still left out. Completion of the distribution marks the end of SIR’s first stage.

CEO office sources said that around 60 lakh voters have been marked “non-traceable” after booth-level officers (BLOs) failed to hand over the forms in person. In these cases, BLOs pasted notices on the doors of the voters’ homes, directing them to get in touch by a specified date. Those who failed to respond have been flagged as non-traceable.

The special revision exercise — being conducted for the first time since 2002 — began on 4 November and is expected to continue until March next year.

Under the SIR rules, voters whose names (or their parents’ names) were not on the 2002 electoral roll must submit one of 11 documents prescribed by the Election Commission of India (ECI) to retain their names.

With IANS inputs