Kolkata, Jan 20 (IANS) The Election Commission of India (ECI), on Tuesday, appointed 12 more special electoral roll observers for West Bengal to review the ongoing special intensive revision (SIR) in the state.

These 12 special electoral roll observers are Harsh Mangla, Nand Kumarum, P Bala Kiran, Prasanna R, Raghav Langer, Ravi Shanakar, Shashank Mishra, V. Kiran Gopal, S. Venkateshpathy, Nishitha Upadhyay, Devesh Daval, and Gaya Prasad.

The notifications for each of these 12 additional special electoral roll observers are available with IANS.

With the appointment of these 12 special electoral roll observers, the total number of special roll observers rises to 33, the highest among the states and Union Territories where the parallel SIR exercise is being conducted.

Since the beginning of the SIR exercise, there has been a periodic increase in the number of special electoral roll observers, considering the sensitivity of the voter list exercise in the state.

The team of special electoral roll observers in West Bengal is led by Subrata Gupta, a retired Indian Administrative Service officer from the West Bengal cadre.

These 33 new special electoral roll observers will be in addition to the 6,500 micro-observers already appointed by the ECI to review the ongoing hearing sessions on claims and objections on the draft voters’ list in West Bengal.

The concept of inducting micro-observers to review the hearing sessions had been exclusive in case of West Bengal among the other states and Union Territories where the parallel SIR exercise is being conducted.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had written to the Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar objecting to the move on appointment of micro-observers and alleging that the ongoing SIR of electoral rolls in the state is being carried out with the sole objective of deleting and excluding names of existing voters, rather than correcting errors or including new voters.

Insiders from the office of the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer said that the Commission’s decision to appoint these additional 12 special electoral roll observers has been taken as ECI does not find the roles of certain district magistrates, the district electoral officers (DEOs), electoral registration officers (EROs) and assistant electoral registration officers (AEROs) in conformity with the ECI-set guidelines for the voter revision exercise.

–IANS

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