KOLKATA: The Trinamool Congress (TMC) national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee on Saturday launched another scathing attack on the Election Commission of India (ECI) and Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar.
Addressing a rally in Alipurduar in north Bengal—a BJP stronghold—Banerjee said, “Do you know Gyanesh Kumar? He is a magician. He can make living beings disappear from voter lists and make the dead walk. He is now ‘Vanish Kumar’.”
Referring to what he described as illegitimate deletions of voters during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process in West Bengal, ahead of the 2026 state polls, Banerjee repeatedly targeted the Election Commission, calling the CEC “Vanish Kumar”.
Targeting the SIR exercise, Banerjee—considered the second most influential leader in the party after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee—alleged that the names of eligible voters were being arbitrarily removed from electoral rolls.
He claimed that party leaders had approached the Election Commission’s office in Delhi seeking clarity and transparency regarding the revision process.
“We asked them to provide information and make everything public. But now magic is happening. Living citizens are vanishing,” he alleged.
Criticising the Narendra Modi-led union government, Banerjee said, “Ten years ago, people were forced to stand in queues because of demonetisation. The amount of black money has only increased since then. People are again being made to stand in lines. Earlier, people chose the government. Now the government wants to decide who will be a voter.”
The Trinamool Congress MP from Diamond Harbour also urged voters to use electronic voting machines to “teach a lesson” to the BJP, which he accused of weakening democratic rights.
“Those who want to change the Constitution will eventually be removed from power,” he said.
Banerjee further accused the BJP of attempting to roll back welfare schemes in West Bengal, particularly Lakshmir Bhandar, a direct benefit transfer programme for women. Warning voters of an alleged attack on their rights, he said, “If you do not strike back now, they will try to take away your voting rights,” describing the 2026 Assembly elections as decisive.
It was the second of his 26 scheduled public meetings as part of his 19-day statewide campaign, titled ‘Abar Jitbe Bangla’ (Bengal Will Win Again).
On Friday, at a rally in Baruipur in South 24 Parganas district, Banerjee had paraded two men and a woman who were allegedly marked as dead in the ECI’s draft electoral rolls.
“These three people have been marked dead by the Election Commission in the Special Intensive Revision of the electoral rolls,” he told the gathering at the Rano Sankalpa Sabha in Baruipur.