west-bengal-sir-hearings-for-32-lakh-unmapped-voters-to-begin

The first phase of hearings under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls for nearly 32 lakh unmapped voters in West Bengal is set to begin, officials said, with as many as 4,000 micro-observers to be trained for the same.

Hearings for this category include voters who could not link their names with those of their family members in the 2002 electoral rolls, an official at the office of the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer said.

During the enumeration phase, a total of 31,68,424 unmapped voters were identified across the state, he said.

While the hearings are set to start from December 27, trainings for the micro-observers, all of whom are from the state, said the official, will be held in two phases on December 24 in Kolkata.

“We have started sending notices to around 10 lakh such voters from today, while the same will be issued to another 22 lakh voters from Tuesday,” he added.

 

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Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee, had alleged on Monday that the micro-observers lack knowledge of the local Bengali language.

The officer further informed that proceedings will be conducted at district magistrates’ offices, sub-divisional offices, various government departments, as well as in schools and colleges, and each hearing will be conducted under the supervision of a micro-observer.

The next phase, meanwhile, will be for voters with logical discrepancies, for which guidelines have been sought from the Election Commission, another official said on Monday.

Meanwhile, a delegation from the Election Commission is scheduled to visit the state to review the progress of the SIR of the electoral rolls, sources in the office of the state CEO said.

“The commission’s Principal Scretary SB Joshi and Deputy Secretary Abhinav Agarwal will arrive in the state to assess the progress of the hearing phase under the SIR process,” an official said.

The officials will also attend the training programme for micro-observers on December 24, he added.