West Bengal assembly elections: Experts slam SIR, call it 'bloodless political genocide'

KOLKATA: Economist Parakala Prabhakar dubbed the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in Bengal as a 'bloodless political genocide,' while speaking at an event in the city on Sunday.

According to him, the SIR process is leading to large-scale disenfranchisement of the people. The economist emphasized that SIR was creating two classes of people in the country. While one had voting rights, the other didn't. Though those deprived of their voting rights remain citizens, they are stripped of a significant feature of citizenship, he said.




Prabhakar said the complete transformation of India's culture and society can also affect the economy. He urged the formation of an association for deleted voters for restoration of their right to vote. He was speaking at a press conference organised by the Educationists' Forum.

SC lawyer Prashant Bhushan, Yogendra Yadav, and Akhil Swami also voiced their concerns on deletion of voters' names from SIR list in the name of 'logical discrepancies'.

Om Prakash Mishra, a professor and member of the forum, said, "The so-called logical discrepancies had no logic. If there were discrepancies, how could they be logical?"

Yadav said SIR was a 'Special Impediment Removal' exercise by the Election Commission to serve BJP's political agenda. " I had said Bihar was a trial run to target Bengal. I was exactly afraid of this. If they (BJP) have to win Bengal, it is necessary to cut its voter list. That's what SIR is," he said.

Citing logical discrepancies, the poll body carried out targeted deletions with 65% of omitted voters being Muslims, he claimed.

Many people lost their voting rights because of spelling mistakes, space between names, or incorrect age differences, he added.

Questioning the data, he said, "The EC and the BJP allege that the unmapped figure was very low in Bengal. Artificially low. In Bengal, it was 4.5%, I checked. What was the unmapped proportion in Chhattisgarh? It was 3.5% in MP and 1.6% in Rajasthan."

They urged the apex court to find a solution to restore the citizens' voting rights. Prashant Bhushan said adjudication was carried out only in Bengal. He warned that if this continued, the Centre could face an uprising by the citizens, who elect governments to govern on their behalf.
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