Only 1,468 Voters’ Names Restored Before Last Phase of WB Polls

Kolkata: A day ahead of the second and final phase of the Assembly Elections in West Bengal, the Election Commission (EC) restored the names of only 1,468 voters and 19 retired judges who were deleted from the state’s electoral roll after getting approval from the appellate courts for their addition, following the Supreme Court’s recent renewed pressure on the Calcutta High Court to expedite the process.

These names were quietly uploaded on the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer’s website early on Tuesday but were not made public. According to EC officials, these ‘added’ voters can check their status with their EPIC number in their respective constituencies after clicking on ‘Appeal Court Supplementary List No 2’ on the poll panel’s website and exercise their right to vote on Wednesday.

Most of the 1,468 names ‘added’ are from Kolkata. 677 are in South Kolkata, 596 in North Kolkata, followed by 77 in Howrah, 39 in Nadia, 34 in North 24 Parganas, 30 in South 24 Parganas, 8 in East Burdwan and 7 in Hooghly. EC officials also announced that the names of six other voters who were supposed to vote on Wednesday were deleted by the appeals courts. Why they fell remains a mystery.

But EC officials seem to be in the dark about how many cases are still pending for ‘addition’ or ‘deletion’ from the tally of around 27.16 lakh voters marked as ‘ineligible’ among the total deletions of around 90.83 lakh in the EC’s special massive overhaul in the state.

The fate of thousands of pending cases is still unknown, as the restoration of the names of only 1,468 voters reflects another example of very slow progress in resolving them. Earlier, the EC could only restore 139 names deleted from the state voter list and removed eight more after they were cleared by appellate courts from a tally of 657 resolved applications, just a day before the first phase of polls on April 23.

1) West Bengal is heading to the second and final phase of Assembly Elections on Wednesday, covering 142 seats in seven districts known as the ruling bastion of the Trinamul Congress. In these seats spread across Kolkata, North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas, Nadia, Howrah, Hooghly and Burdwan East, around 3.21 crore voters are expected to decide the fate of 1,448 candidates from TMC, BJP, CPI(M), Congress and various other parties. TMC had won 123 out of 142 seats in 2021. But all eyes will be on the voter turnout, which created a national record in the first phase on April 23, driven by a special intensive revision of the Election Commission’s SIR.

2) A day before the second and final phase of the Assembly Elections in West Bengal, the Election Commission (EC) returned the names of only 1,468 voters who were deleted from the state voter rolls after their addition was approved by the appellate courts comprising 19 retired judges following a fresh initiative by the Supreme Court in the Calcutta High Court to expedite the process. These names were quietly uploaded on the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer’s website early on Tuesday. However, their lists were not made public. According to EC officials, these ‘added’ voters can check their status with their EPIC number in their respective constituencies after clicking on ‘Appeal Court Supplementary List No 2’ on the poll panel’s website and exercise their right to vote on Wednesday.