KOLKATA: The West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Manoj Agarwal on Saturday urged the Election Commission of India (ECI) to extend the February 7 deadline for completion of hearings of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the State by one more week.
In 15 to 20 assembly constituencies in districts like South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Howrah and electoral districts, including Kolkata Uttar and Kolkata Dakshin, the proceedings have not yet been completed.
Sources in the office of the CEO said that the Commission has not yet given its nod to Agarwal’s proposal for extension of the deadline for hearings and other related processes like submission of Form-6 for inclusion of names and objections of voters, etc.
Earlier, the national poll body had targeted a February 14 deadline for publication of the final electoral rolls in the state.
Agarwal made the date extension proposal to the ECI after the district electoral registration officers (DEOs), as well as the district magistrates of respective districts under which reported assembly constituencies are situated, sent status reports on the SIR hearing to him today.
“Several DEOs have appealed to me to extend the date of hearings, and based on their appeals, I wrote a letter to the Commission requesting extension of the deadline for one more week,” Agarwal told reporters later in the day.
“The deadline for publication of the final voters’ list will be extended if the Commission approves my request to extend the February 7 deadline, the last day for hearings, for one more week,” he added.
The SIR hearings started in the state on December 27 last year.
Today, the Commission also validated the domicile certificate issued by the West Bengal government as documentary evidence for the SIR hearings in the State. The ECI has conveyed the matter to Agarwal.
The Bengal Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee, has been slamming the ECI for invalidating domicile certificates for SIR in the State.
“Domicile certificate, which is accepted everywhere, is being rejected in West Bengal,” Mamata had said while addressing a rally recently in north Bengal.
The Commission, in its letter to Agarwal, stated that domicile certificates are issued as per the West Bengal government’s notification of 1999, followed by an amendment.
Domicile certificates issued by district magistrates, additional district magistrates, sub-divisional officers (SDOs) and the collectorate of Kolkata would be accepted as valid documents, as per the state government notification.
The national poll body has directed the Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and Assistant EROs to accept these certificates and asked all poll officials to follow the instructions properly during the ongoing voters’ lists revision process.
Meanwhile, the poll panel has already extended the deadline 6 March for publication of the final electoral rolls to 10 April in BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh.