Senior Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Vibhu Goel has been appointed as an Additional Chief Electoral Officer (ACEO) for West Bengal. Goel’s role is to coordinate with the judges overseeing the 19 Appellate Tribunals handling cases of voter name deletions due to “logical discrepancy.” He will serve as the main link between the Election Commission of India (ECI), Appellate Tribunal judges, and the Calcutta High Court.
In his new position, Goel will be responsible for ensuring real-time communication of ECI instructions to the Appellate Tribunal judges. He will also oversee the readiness of infrastructure and logistics at tribunal venues, manage staff, technical support, transport, and security arrangements, as per the notification issued by the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of West Bengal, Manoj Kumar Agarwal.
The notification further outlines Goel’s duties, which include monitoring and communicating the status of appeal uploads on the ECI portal for respective districts. He will coordinate with the judges on honorarium, disbursement modalities, and timelines, as well as address queries and grievances raised by them. Goel will facilitate seamless coordination by communicating readiness timelines and operational preparedness of the Appellate Tribunals to the judges and the Calcutta High Court.
The responsibilities assigned to Goel aim to ensure smooth, accountable, and time-bound coordination in the functioning of Appellate Tribunals under SIR 2026, as per the requisition conveyed by the Registrar General of the Calcutta High Court.
To recap, the final voters’ list in West Bengal, excluding cases referred for judicial adjudication, was published on February 28. Supplementary lists will be released as the adjudication process progresses. Before the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) for West Bengal last November, the state had 7,66,37,529 voters. In the draft voters’ list from December, 58,20,899 names were deleted, increasing to 63,66,952 deletions in the final list on February 28.
