Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee met the Election Commission bench over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, and alleged that the party’s concerns were not addressed and the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) was “aggressive”. The 10-member delegation that met the EC panel included Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien, MPs Saket Gokhale, Ritabrata Banerjee and Mamata Thakur, and ministers from West Bengal, including Manas Bhunia, Pradip Mazumdar, and Chandrima Bhattacharya.
The TMC national general secretary also said that the party would not accept the final voter list after the SIR in Bengal if they found “discrepancies” in it. He also said that the party would contest the SIR legally.
He alleged that “vote chori” (vote theft) in elections is happening through the voter list and not through EVMs, and stressed that states like Maharashtra, Haryana and Bihar could have been won by opposition parties if they had aggressively raised the issue.
Speaking of the CEC, Abhishek Banerjee said the Chief Election Commissioner was “aggressive” during the meeting.
“When we started talking, he [CEC] started losing his temper… I said you are nominated, I am elected… If he has the guts, he should release the footage,” he said.
When asked if the party would accept the final voter list, Abhishek Banerjee said, “If it has discrepancies, why would we accept it. We would fight it legally.”
Calling it a “conspiracy to malign” West Bengal, Abhishek Banerjee said the “bogey of infiltration” was being raised and dared the poll panel to identify Bangladeshis and Rohingyas among the 58 lakh names dropped from the draft electoral roll
“There is selective targeting, allegations of infiltration, which are leaked to malign West Bengal. We asked the CEC to come out with a list of how many Bangladeshis or Rohingyas have been found in West Bengal,” Abhishek Banerjee said.
He also questioned the EC’s move to retroactively introduce a new category termed “logical discrepancies”, summoning 1.36 crore voters for hearing on different grounds, including issues like mismatch of father’s name, questionable age gap between parents and children, among others.
Banerjee said they have urged the Commission that senior citizens, people with disabilities and those with comorbidities should not be called for the hearing, and should be provided a hearing at home.
“I appeal to all, the vote-chori is happening in the voters’ list, not through EVMs. You don’t know what algorithm, software they are using to disenfranchise people. They are trying to weaponise the electoral roll,” he said.
“Earlier, voters used to decide the government; now the government is deciding the voters,” he said.
“The whole country should unite, every party should catch this vote-theft… This is why opposition parties lost Haryana, Delhi, Maharashtra and Bihar… People wanted to vote for them,” he claimed, stressing that the opposition’s fight is required not on media or social media, but on the ground.
“People are watching, if you put up a fight, the BJP won’t win, because it will be the people who decide,” he said.
