Kolkata, Jan 13 (IANS) The Election Commission of India (ECI) has clarified its plans to appoint 2,000 additional micro-observers for the hearing session on claims and objections to the draft voters’ list in West Bengal, and to consider a proposal to increase the number of hearing centres.

An insider from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) explained that the decision to appoint these 2,000 additional micro-observers had been taken not just because such a large number of “logical discrepancy” cases had been identified in the course of “progeny mapping”, but also because of the diverse nature of discrepancies identified by the system.

While the total number of logical discrepancy cases identified in “progeny mapping” is so huge at nine lakhs, at least six forms of discrepancies have been identified in the case of these voters. In certain cases, more than one discrepancy has come to the notice of the ECI.

“On one hand, there is a deadline to complete the hearing within a reasonable period before the publication of the final voters’ list on February 14 this year. At the same time, the Commission is determined to ensure that the name of a single genuine voter is not deleted from the voters’ list, and also that the name of a single bogus voter is deleted from the list. Since a thorough examination of the logical discrepancy cases is required to achieve that goal, there was a necessity for increasing the number of micro-observers,” a source in the CEO’s office explained.

The training for the 2,000 newly appointed micro-observers will be on January 15, and from the very next they will be assigned to different hearing centres.

Like the previous appointment, these 2,000 additional micro-observers will be appointed from the Central government staff or staff from central public sector undertakings or public sector banks, from the Group B and Group A categories.

The appointment of micro-observers is only happening in the case of West Bengal and not in other states and union territories where parallel Special Intensive Revisions (SIRs) are being conducted.

Recently, the ECI has cautioned the micro-observers in West Bengal of strong disciplinary action in case of any deliberate deviation from the prescribed standard operating procedure (SOP) for them.

Last week, the ECI announced appointments of four additional special roll observers for the state, and one of the two main assignments for them is to review the performance of the micro-observers at the hearing sessions.

–IANS

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