Kolkata, Oct 31 (IANS) Trinamool Congress general secretary and the party Lok Sabha member, Abhishek Banerjee, on Friday, instructed the booth-level agents (BLAs) of the party to shadow the booth-level officers (BLOs) appointed by the Election Commission of India (ECI) for the special intensive revision (SIR) exercise, the first stage of which is starting from November 4.

The role of BLOs is most crucial in the first stage of the three-stage SIR exercise, since in that phase, the BLOs will reach every doorstep with the enumeration forms and collect the details of the voters concerned. At the end of the first phase, the draft voters’ list in the state will be announced.

Hence, it is presumed that the instructions for the BLAs to shadow the BLOs are meant for the first phase only.

The instructions to the BLOs on this count were given at a virtual organisational meeting of the party, which was chaired by Abhishek Banerjee and attended to fix the to fix organisational responsibilities of the party leaders, elected responsibilities, members in the state cabinet, and grassroots-level party workers for the SIR.

“It was also decided at the virtual organisational meeting that the party will open area-wise help-desks throughout the state to assist the voters from November 4, and these helpdesks will continue to operate till the entire SIR exercise is over. There will be a total of 6,200 helpdesks throughout the state. These helpdesks will operate from November 4 to December 4 daily between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.,” said a party leader who attended the meeting.

The last time that the SIR was conducted in West Bengal was in 2002. The current SIR is being conducted with the voters’ list in 2002 being the base.

Since the beginning, the SIR had been a controversial issue in West Bengal. Trinamool Congress had described the SIR as an indirect ploy to slap the NRC in West Bengal. On the other hand, the BJP had claimed that Trinamool Congress was opposing SIR out of the fear that the names of illegal Bangladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators would be deleted from the voters’ list.

–IANS

src/pgh