ECI eases SIR hearings for migrant workers and outstation students in Bengal

The Election Commission of India (ECI) has relaxed procedural requirements under the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, allowing migrant workers and students residing outside the state to skip physical appearances at hearing sessions.

Clarifying the revised norms, officials said voters flagged under the “logical discrepancy” category, including migrant workers employed in other states and students pursuing education outside West Bengal, will not be required to be present in person for hearings. Instead, their family members will be permitted to attend the sessions on their behalf and submit the necessary documents to address the commission’s concerns.

Sources in the office of the state’s Chief Electoral Officer said the relaxation was granted after considering the exceptionally high number of migrant workers and outstation students from West Bengal, making physical attendance impractical in many cases.

Booth-level officers (BLOs), who are serving notices at voters’ residences, have also been instructed to explain to voters or their family members why a particular name has been identified as a “logical discrepancy” during the process of progeny mapping, which tracks familial and residential links within the electoral roll.

In a parallel move, the ECI has sought declarations from West Bengal government employees certifying that they are not enrolled as voters at more than one location, amid concerns over duplicate entries.

The commission has already completed hearings for voters classified as “unmapped”, a category comprising over 30 lakh names across the state. From Tuesday, notices have begun going out to voters listed under the “logical discrepancy” category in the draft electoral roll published on December 16 last year.

Officials estimate that around 92 lakh voters have been flagged as logical discrepancy cases. Hearings for this category are scheduled to begin on 13 January, leaving less than a month to complete the process before the final electoral roll is published on 14 February.

Following the release of the draft list, a full bench of the Election Commission is expected to visit Kolkata to review the progress of the revision exercise. Poll dates for the state’s crucial Assembly elections, due later this year, are likely to be announced shortly thereafter.

The scale and pace of the SIR exercise have placed significant pressure on both election officials and voters, even as the commission insists the measures are necessary to ensure the accuracy and integrity of the electoral roll ahead of the polls.

With IANS inputs