While West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee has been up in arms against the Election Commission’s proposed Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the state, her party leaders, including the MLAs and MPs, have ramped up their preparations for it.
Holding the TMC workers’ meetings in their constituencies, the party legislators have been galvanising them into getting their act together for the impending SIR exercise.
At these meetings, several legislators have made a common pitch to the party’s rank and file: “Go with BLOs (Block Level Officers) when they go to the houses in your areas for the SIR… ensure that not a single voter’s name is deleted.”
The EC is poised to roll out the SIR in Bengal in the run-up to the Assembly polls slated for March-April 2026. The poll body has intensified its pre-SIR preparations, mapping existing electors to the voters’ list of 2002, when the last intensive revision was carried out across the state.
On June 24, the EC had ordered an SIR across the country, starting with the poll-bound Bihar, where the latest voters’ list was compared to the 2003 list, when the last intensive revision was conducted there. Those Bihar electors who did not figure in the 2003 rolls were required to submit documents proving their date and/or place of birth, to establish eligibility.
Addressing an event in Kolkata last Friday, Mamata urged the TMC leaders and workers to stay vigilant during the SIR, asking them to ensure that voters’ rights are protected.
The CM has targeted the EC and the BJP-ruled Centre for allegedly plotting “backdoor implementation of the NRC (National Register of Citizens) through SIR”, maintaining that the TMC would not allow arbitrary deletion of names from the voters’ list.
On Sunday, TMC MP from Bankura, Arup Chakraborty, while addressing a party workers’ meeting in Simlipal, said: “Tairi thakun (be ready). BLOs will start visiting houses. Wherever BLOs go, you should accompany them. If some voters are not present, you collect the forms on their behalf (from BLOs) and ensure that the forms are filled up.”
He also said, “We will not allow a single name to be deleted from the voters’ list. If names are removed, lakhs of people will go to Delhi and gherao the EC office.”
A day earlier, TMC MLA from Labhpur, Abhijit Sinha, told party workers: “From the day BLOs start visiting villagers, our Booth Level Agents (BLAs) will have to go with them. Be ready. If any problem is found (in the villages) you will have to sort it out or protest.”
Slamming MP Arup Chakraborty, BJP leader and ex-Bankura MP Subhas Sarkar said: “Why would someone else fill up forms for absent voters? This is illegal. I would ask them (TMC workers) not to go with BLOs. There will be central forces with them. They may lathi charge or even open fire if you create problems. Why create trouble and face such a situation?”
Speaking to The Indian Express, Chakraborty said, “The Opposition is twisting my comments. I had said and still say that BLOs have to go house to house. If any voter is absent, who may be a migrant worker or has gone out of home for some work – his form will have to be handed over to his family members. Then our workers or BLAs will ensure that it is properly filled up, signed by the voter and sent to BLOs. We fear that BLOs may not go house to house or visit a house twice. I have even told workers’ committees in villages to oversee the BLOs’ work. We have to ensure that not a single geuine voter’s name is deleted. I have no problem if dead voters’ names are removed.”
Speaking to The Indian Express, TMC spokesperson Arup Chakraborty said, “We have 10 to 15 workers in each of Bengal’s 82,000 booths. We want to ensure that no genuine voters get deleted from the electoral rolls due to the SIR. That is why our leaders are asking our BLAs to oversee this process. BJP does not have workers in over 35,000 booths, so they cannot name BLAs everywhere. That is why they are talking about central forces, lathi charge and firing.”
The TMC and the BJP have been at loggerheads over the SIR, with the principal Opposition arguing that it would help in weeding out illegal migrants from the voters’ list in the state.
Criticising both the parties, the CPI(M) central committee member, Sujan Chakraborty, told the Express: “As the elections approach, there is no talk of jobs, education or development from both TMC and BJP. Leaders of both parties are playing to the gallery, indulging in posturing. However, it is true that there are a large number of dead and ghost voters. TMC fears that if the names of such voters are removed they will be in trouble during the elections. That is why they are instigating their workers to prevent or even disrupt the SIR process. Our party wants a clean, proper voters’ list in Bengal.”