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In Bengal SIR faceoff, police complaints now against CEC Gyanesh Kumar
According to TMC MLA Saokat Molla, seven people from his constituency filed complaints against CEC Gyanesh Kumar for their alleged harassment during SIR.
The West Bengal police registered several complaints against chief election commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar in South 24 Parganas district on Friday. The complaints were filed over alleged harassment of people during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the Trinamool Congress (TMC)-ruled state, which goes to the polls in a matter of months.
The SIR faceoff has continued even after the Supreme Court on Friday decided to depute judicial officers in West Bengal to adjudicate claims of voters listed under the “logical discrepancy” category in the ongoing exercise.
Canning Purba legislator Saokat Molla, belonging to chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s TMC, accompanied seven people who filed their complaints at the Jibantala Police Station. The complainants alleged that they faced harassment during the SIR of the electoral rolls in the state.
"We have received seven complaints against the CEC over alleged harassment during the ongoing SIR and will examine them," a police officer quoted in a PTI report said. The complaints had not yet led to FIRs.
The SIR was rolled out in Bengal on November 4 last year. The draft electoral roll, published on December 16, excised 5.8 million voters, and another 11.6 million were flagged under the controversial “logical discrepancy” criterion.
What TMC says
According to TMC MLA Saokat Molla, seven people from his constituency filed complaints against CEC Gyanesh Kumar for their alleged harassment during the electoral roll revision exercise.
"About 33,000 names were recommended for deletion in my constituency in the past three days. The move was aimed at disenfranchising genuine voters. Many of these people possess documents and have already attended SIR hearings," the TMC legislator said.
Molla claimed that nearly 90 per cent of these names belonged to the Muslim community and accused Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of "acting as a broker for the BJP".
"The CEC is orchestrating a planned conspiracy to reduce minority voters," he alleged.
Opposition BJP hits out at TMC
A local BJP leader, however, questioned how the TMC MLA had come to know about the deletions when no such list had been officially published.
"He should be aware that an FIR cannot be filed against the head of the Election Commission of India," the BJP functionary said.
List to come out on February 28
In an unprecedented move, the Supreme Court on Friday decided to depute judicial officers in West Bengal to adjudicate claims of voters listed under the “logical discrepancy” category in the ongoing SIR exercise, acknowledging that this was an extraordinary decision in view of the extraordinary circumstances.
A three-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant noted the “trust deficit” and an “unfortunate blame game” between the elected state government and the EC and underlined the significance of completing the SIR exercise before the state elections a few months later.
“We are left with hardly another option but to request the chief justice of the Calcutta high court to spare some serving judicial officers, along with former judicial officers with impeccable integrity, in the rank of additional district judge or district judge, who can then, in each district, be requested to revisit or dispose of claims under the category of logical discrepancy,” the bench comprising justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Panchol said.
“The circumstances being extraordinary, the request for entrustment to judicial officers or former judicial officers is also of an extraordinary nature,” the bench said, noting that it was important to ensure “fairness in adjudication of genuineness of documents” that would determine inclusion and exclusion of voters in the state’s electoral roll.
ECI has conducted 660,000 hearings, and the final rolls are set to be published on February 28.
