Kolkata, March 25 A top EC official in Kolkata said on Wednesday that nearly 40 per cent of the 32 lakh names that have been reviewed so far have been removed from the electoral rolls of West Bengal.
Converting to actual figures, the number of electors removed after review currently stands at 13 lakh.
With around 63 lakh names having been removed earlier during the SIR exercise in the state, the total number of removed voters rose to nearly 76 lakh, the official confirmed.
The election panel released the first supplementary list of 'Under Review' voters on Monday, but remained tight-lipped about the number of deletions or the precise figure of cases disposed of in that list, drawing criticism from various quarters.
A total of 58 lakh names were removed following the enumeration phase of the SIR exercise, reducing the state's eligible electors from the initial 7.66 crore to 7.08 crore due to reasons such as death, migration, duplication, and untraceability.
The rolls published on February 28 further reduced the number of valid voters to a little over 7.04 crore, which included the placement of over 60 lakh names under judicial scrutiny.
With 32 lakh cases disposed of so far, around 28 lakh cases still remain to be cleared by the 705 judicial officers currently working in the state.
The official said that around 10 lakh names were uploaded on the EC website during the publication of the first supplementary list on Monday, but added that he had no information on the exact number of deletions in that list.
The state's Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Agarwal had informed prior to the publication of the supplementary list that nearly 29 lakh cases had been processed.
“Only those names that were approved through the e-sign authentication process could be included in the published list,” the official said.
According to officials, only a third of the 29 lakh processed entries could be initially published due to technical issues such as the absence of e-sign authentication from the concerned judicial officers.
“Not all processed entries could be published earlier due to procedural requirements. The remaining are being released in phases,” he said.
According to the EC, the subsequent supplementary lists are scheduled to be published every Friday of the following weeks, indicating that the second list will come out in two days.
Meanwhile, the CEO has moved to the Calcutta High Court seeking permission to publish supplementary electoral rolls daily. The court, however, said the matter would be heard after March 27.