The name of 74-year-old Manjurani Saha has surfaced in the voter list of the Barasat Assembly constituency in North 24 Parganas, even as her name also appears in the voter roll of the Dhaka Narayanganj municipality area in Bangladesh. Adding to the confusion, her name figured in the draft list of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of West Bengal’s electoral rolls.
The presence of the same individual in voter lists of two countries has raised serious questions.
The anomaly came to light during the “super checking” of voter documents by micro observers. Officials said Manjurani Saha is not an isolated case. The names of several Bangladeshi citizens have reportedly been found in Bengal’s SIR draft list, a matter that has now drawn the attention of the Election Commission.
Additionally, there are about another lakh names in the 'suspicious' list where the commission is not ruling out Bangladeshi connections. According to sources, while examining the 'logical discrepancy' list, instances have emerged where 389 people identified one person in Nanur, Birbhum, as their father in the SIR enumeration form.
One father, 310 children
In Sankrail, Howrah, one 'father' has 310 'children', in Murshidabad, one person has 199, and in Darjeeling, 155 'children' have been shown. Jalpaiguri's Nagrakata (120 people) and West Burdwan's Asansol (170 people) are not far behind in showing one person as 'father'.
In Bengal's SIR, at least two people have been shown as 'father' of 200 people so far, seven people as 'father' of 100 people, and at least 50 or more voters have shown 10 people as their 'father'. More than 2 lakh 6 thousand people are there who have more than 6 children. 8,682 people have shown their number of children as more than 10. The commission is examining whether Bangladeshi citizens have submitted fraudulent documents among these as well.
According to sources from the state Chief Electoral Officer's (CEO) office, the Foreigner Regional Registration Office (FRRO) is sending them lists of such Bangladeshi names almost daily. Mainly those who came to India with Bangladeshi passport-visa for medical treatment, business, studies or other work and then created Indian documents through local agents and got their names included in India's voter list – the FRRO has asked to remove the names of such individuals from the voter list here with their documents.
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According to sources, at least 2,700 such Bangladeshi names have been sent to the commission in just two months since the publication of the draft list. More than 200 names came in the first week of February alone. The commission suspects that the names of more Bangladeshis remain in the Indian voter list beyond these. According to the CEO office sources, as an example, Mohammad Azirul Haque, a resident of Chapra and Hanskhali in Nadia, in this list, identified himself as Kanchan Jamadar, and Shahimul Ahmed identified himself as Shahimul Jamadar to get their names included in the Indian voter list. The commission will have to remove these names from the list.
According to the CEO office sources, the names of many such suspicious voters have been found who Booth Level Officers (BLOs) identified as dead, missing, transferred or duplicate voters during the collection of SIR enumeration forms. Beyond that, many names have been found whose documents are under suspicion and are being verified after being identified as 'a logical discrepancy'. If not satisfied with the documents, those names will also be removed.
At the same time, the CEO office has also warned EROs and AEROs that concerned officials may face punishment if the names of Bangladeshi infiltrators remain in the final SIR list. BLOs will also not be able to avoid responsibility.
However, several months before the SIR, after a suspected militant of the militant organisation 'Ansarullah Bangla Team' (ABT) was caught, it was revealed that despite being a Bangladeshi citizen, their names were in the voter lists of two separate assembly constituencies in two districts of the state. Since then, the FRRO has been continuously sending lists in phases to remove such Bangladeshi voter names.
