West Bengal: Presiding officer in 12 polls now finds himself out of rolls

KOLKATA/RANAGHAT: A 97-year-old Partition refugee who never missed a vote is struck off the rolls. A 72-year-old retired teacher who presided over a dozen polls is deleted despite papers. A 68-year-old collapsed and died in a tribunal queue. Fallout from SIR has rippled across Bengal.

Subarna Bala Poddar, born in undivided Bengal and displaced in 1947, has voted in every election. Her name is now missing. Unaware of the omission, she said: "Shorir dile vote debo (If health permits, I will vote)." If she fails to vote? She shot back: "I have a voter's card. Why can't I vote?"




Her family from Narkeldanga in Kolkata said she earlier used the home voting facility. This time, despite submitting voter ID, Aadhaar, passbook and widow pension records, her claim failed. A spelling error - "Swarna Bala" in 2002 rolls - triggered a hearing, and documents were rejected. Fresh inclusion via Form 6 also failed. Four of eight family members will vote; four, including two grandsons, have lost rights. A TMC booth agent said the rolls in that area fell from 1,326 to 1,092.

In Hooghly, S Asraful Haque, a retired teacher who served as presiding officer in 12 elections, has been deleted while his family remains on rolls. He produced a passport, land records, PAN, Aadhaar and bank papers. "We have been living here for generations. I have ancestral land records from 1944. In the 1956 voter list, my parents' names were there, and I have that document. My name was there in the 2002 list. Still, I was called for a hearing. No specific reason was mentioned in the notice," he said.

He has appealed to a tribunal. "Is it possible to delete the name of a person who has a passport, land records and pension order?" he asked after finding himself under adjudication and then in a supplementary deletion list.



In Nadia's Ranaghat, Jibankrishna Biswas died after collapsing while waiting in a queue outside an SDO office to file an appeal over deletion of his and his daughter's names. His kin blamed stress linked to SIR. TMC staged a protest, blaming the Centre for his death. "Politics took his life," his daughter said.

Across districts, families recounted hearings without clear reasons, documents deemed insufficient, and sudden shifts from "adjudication" to deletion. For many, the right to vote has turned into a race through offices, queues and paperwork, with no guarantee of return.