West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee expressed disappointment with the Election Commission for removing names from the state’s electoral rolls after the Special Intensive Revision exercise. She accused the Election Commission and the BJP of collaborating to eliminate genuine voters from the lists, alleging bias and a violation of democratic rights. Banerjee vowed to secure victory in the Bhabanipur Assembly constituency, emphasizing her determination even if only one voter remains.
Her criticism followed the release of the final electoral rolls on February 28 post the SIR exercise. Banerjee claimed that the deletions were a deliberate attempt to sway the upcoming Assembly elections’ results, attributing the actions to the BJP. The Election Commission reported that approximately 8.3% of voters, totaling 63.66 lakh names, were deleted, reducing the state’s voter count to just over 7.04 crore.
Moreover, an additional 60.06 lakh voters were categorized as “under adjudication” and are awaiting verification in the following weeks. The Bhabanipur Assembly constituency had previously seen about 44,000 deletions in the draft electoral roll from December, with over 14,000 names still under review.
