The Election Commission of India(ECI) has officially addressed the government of West Bengal with respect to the alleged failure to comply with its instructions in connection with the current Special Intensive Revision(SIR) of the electoral rolls. The poll body has requested the state to hand in compliance reports by February 9.
The ECI in a letter to the chief secretary of the state indicated that at least five specific instructions were contravened. The message was received only hours after the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee came out to personally present her case before the Supreme Court and ask the court to save democracy and lives of people. During the hearing of the case, the apex court requested the ECI to act on the issue of concern that its notices sent out to millions of voters had errors in spelling and dialect differences during the SIR process. The case will be rescheduled to a further hearing on February 9.
The alleged non-conformance, in the ECI, involves the inability to launch cases of two Electoral Registration officers (EROs) and two Assistant Electoral Registration officers (AEROs) charged with the misconducts of adding fictitious voters and jeopardizing data security. Other concerns that the commission identified included the failure to suspend a non-suspension of an AERO who appointed 11 more AEROs to stand trial, and the assignment of sub-divisional officers to the role of ERO and Returning Officer.
The exercise of the SIR has increased tensions between the ECI and the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) of West Bengal. On Tuesday, Banerjee attacked Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar harshly and he even mentioned the impeachment of the official. Although she admitted that her party has not the numbers in the Parliament, she said there are constitutional provisions of impeachment and could be addressed in the event that there are actions taken in the interest of people.
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