Burdwan, March 04 (TSP Bangla) – The CPM has called for a march to the office of the chief electoral officer (CEO) in Bengal on Wednesday, demanding that elections should not be held without a thorough correction of the voters’ list and the inclusion of all “genuine voters”.
CPM state secretary Md Salim on Tuesday urged party supporters to take to the streets to “fight for the right to franchise”.
Senior CPM leader Biman Bose also appealed to people to gather outside the office of the chief electoral officer, Manoj Kumar Agarwal, at 3pm on Wednesday to stage a demonstration to safeguard voting rights.
Bose alleged that under the pretext of the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, the political narrative of the Bharatiya Janata Party had been “materialised into reality” by the Election Commission of India, led by Gyanesh Kumar. He accused the poll body of acting at the behest of the BJP.
The CPM also alleged that senior state government officials, including district magistrates, subdivisional officers and block development officers, had assisted the commission during the process.
The protest comes after the publication of the preliminary final electoral roll in Bengal on February 28 following the SIR. Around 60 lakh voters were either excluded or kept under adjudication on grounds such as duplication, change of residence or alleged ineligibility.
Opposition parties have claimed that many of the deleted names belong to “genuine voters” and were removed without proper verification, raising fears of possible disenfranchisement ahead of the Assembly elections.
As part of its protest programme, the Left Front has called for the march to the CEO’s office in Kolkata and has also urged supporters to stage demonstrations at the offices of district magistrates, subdivisional officers and block development officers across the state on Wednesday.
Salim said the CPM would not accept any election conducted on what he described as a flawed voters’ list.
“It is almost absurd to conduct Assembly polls in the state without rectifying the voters’ list and enrolling all genuine voters. I will visit the CEO’s office tomorrow to issue this warning, and if necessary, I will remain seated there for as long as required to ensure voting rights for all and to fight for the people’s right to vote,” he said.
Addressing a CPM rally in Purulia on Monday, Salim said: “As long as the Leftists survive, no genuine voter will be allowed to be excluded from the voters’ list.”
Echoing similar concerns, former Congress MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said the Election Commission of India should not announce the Assembly polls in West Bengal without preparing a “foolproof” voters’ list.
Speaking to reporters in Berhampore on Tuesday, he said: “The voters’ list must be foolproof. It hardly matters if a few thousand more judicial officers are required to complete the task. But until the voters’ list becomes foolproof, no election should be announced in the state. Announcing polls at such a time would be equivalent to robbing the people of Bengal of their voting rights.”
