Kolkata, Oct 28 (ANI): Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal Manoj Kumar Agarwal addresses a press conference along others, in Kolkata on Tuesday.
| Photo Credit: ANI
The Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal Manoj Kumar Agarwal, on Tuesday (October 28) said ‘no legitimate voters’ will be removed from the voters’ list during the Special Intensive Revision in West Bengal and that all political parties have agreed to cooperate through the process, following an all-party meeting at his office in Kolkata.
According to figures shared by the CEO’s office, the total number of electors in West Bengal as of October 28, 2025, stands at 7,66,37,529, with an average of around 950 voters or 200 to 300 families per polling station.
“No legitimate voter will be eliminated… We have over 80,000 booth-level officers (BLO), over 8,000 BLO supervisors, over 3,000 assistant electoral registration officers, and 294 electoral registration officers. Apart from that, we have the government machinery as necessary under Article 326 of the Constitution… there will be help desks in every district, along with special help desks in migration pockets,” Mr Agarwal said.
He expressed confidence in being able to successfully complete the SIR process in West Bengal in three months, like in Bihar, pointing out that a key difference between the Bihar SIR and the upcoming SIR in West Bengal is the availability of a machine-readable voters list of the reference year (2002) as a starting base for the exercise.
“The enumerator will go from door-to-door to hand out enumeration forms. We have undertaken certain tabletop exercises which did not happen when SIR began in Bihar. Our BLOs conducted tabletop exercises comparing the names present on the 2002 voters’ list with the names in today’s voters’ list to understand recurring voters, and to find the link with their children who were not on the list then,” Mr Agarwal added.
The CEO clarified that software is also being used by the Election Commission of India (ECI) to detect matches between voter identity cards of 2002 and of today, and that these matches will be put up in the BLO app during their home visits.
Responding to a question by The Hindu, Mr Agarwal also clarified that in the upcoming SIR, Aadhar has been added as the 12th document in addition to the list of 11 indicative documents for SIR, only as identity proof but ‘not as proof of citizenship’.
“The Aadhar card is to be accepted and utilised as a proof of identity and not as a proof of citizenship, in terms of section 9 of the Aadhar Act ,” he said, reading out the Supreme Court order dated September 8 this year.
Speaking on the all-party meeting conducted on Tuesday, the CEO said that he apprised the party representatives about the emuneration forms, documentation, and the procedure.
“We requested them to appoint booth-level agents as far as practical and possible for them in each and every polling station so that they could help. It has to be a consultative exercise which has to be undertaken by all of us conjointly to prepare a free and fair electoral roll,” Mr Agarwal.
He added that he is not worried about the law and order situation during the SIR process in West Bengal, and the local police would be sufficient to ensure the safety of election officials.
Published – October 29, 2025 10:32 am IST
