The Election Commission said that the names of about 26 lakh voters in the current voter list of West Bengal are not matching with the voter list of 2002. An official provided this information on Wednesday. He said the discrepancy came to light when the state’s latest voter list was compared with the lists prepared in different states between 2002 and 2006 during the previous SIR process.
According to Election Commission sources, more than six crore counting forms had been uploaded in West Bengal till Wednesday afternoon under the existing SIR process. “Once uploaded on the portal, these forms are subjected to the ‘mapping’ process, where they are matched with previous SIR records,” the official told PTI.
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Initial findings show that names of about 26 lakh voters in West Bengal are still not matched with the data from the previous SIR cycle.
Earlier, on Tuesday, November 25, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee strongly criticized the Election Commission of India (ECI) regarding the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the voter list. He alleged that this was a politically motivated ploy to prevent genuine voters from voting in the state. Speaking at a rally against SIR in Bongaon in North 24 Parganas district, Banerjee described the ECI as a “BJP commission”. He questioned whether the voter list was being prepared from the BJP office. He vowed to mount a strong protest to save the democratic fabric of Bengal.
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The Trinamool Congress supremo took out a three-kilometre protest march from Bongaon to Thakurnagar, with senior party leaders and enthusiastic supporters waving flags and raising slogans against the SIR exercise. He described it as “chaotic, coercive and dangerous”. Banerjee insisted on selective implementation of SIR in Bengal, but not in BJP-ruled Assam, when elections are due there. He accused the central government of hatching a conspiracy to remove the names of voters for the 2026 assembly elections.