CEC assures fair polls in West Bengal
Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar on Tuesday sought to quell the row over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, assuring that no eligible voter’s name would be removed and pledging free, fair and violence-free elections.
His remarks came amid escalating tensions between the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) over alleged large-scale voter deletions, which have sparked political protests across the State led by CM Mamata Banerjee.
Addressing a press conference after meetings with political parties and senior officials, the CEC said the SIR’s sole purpose was to ensure “pure electoral rolls,” safeguarding the right to vote while preventing ineligible inclusions. He noted that judicial officers have already scrutinised about 10 lakh cases, while nearly 50 lakh are still under review following Supreme Court (SC) directions. Kumar avoided directly commenting on whether the poll schedule would be announced despite pending adjudications. The CEC also announced 100 per cent webcasting of polling stations across the State. He highlighted that West Bengal has historically high voter turnout and that elections are widely respected, coining the EC slogan: “<Chunao porbo, Paschimbanger gorbo></i>” (Election festival is the pride of West Bengal).
According to the ECI, around 63.66 lakh names-8.3 per cent of the electorate-were deleted since November 2025, reducing the voter base from 7.66 crore to 7.04 crore. Of the state’s voters, over 6,000 are centenarians, 5.23 lakh are new voters aged 18-19, and 1.31 crore are between 20-30 years old. About 3.78 lakh voters over 85 will have home voting options. West Bengal has 294 assembly constituencies, including 68 reserved for Scheduled Castes and 16 for Scheduled Tribes, with over 80,000 polling stations-61,000 in rural areas.
Kumar clarified that “Logical Discrepancy” cases flagged during SIR are standard across 12 states, not unique to West Bengal, and arose due to mismatches with the 2002 voter rolls. He said the revision ensures that no eligible voter is left out and no ineligible person is included, underlining that maintaining accurate electoral rolls is “a bedrock of democracy.”
