New Delhi : The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, an Election Commission-led exercise to clean up voter lists by removing dead, duplicate or ineligible names, has now expanded beyond polls. Days after the BJP formed its first government in West Bengal under CM Suvendu Adhikari, the administration signalled that those whose names were deleted during the SIR process would not be eligible for several government welfare schemes.
Simultaneously, Bihar CM Samrat Choudhary said people whose names were deleted from the state’s electoral rolls would not be entitled to government benefits. By linking the databases of welfare schemes with the revised electoral rolls, the SIR exercise is now the basis of the two state governments’ identification of duplicate, deceased and allegedly ineligible beneficiaries to plug leakages in welfare delivery systems.
While the SIR removed around 65 lakh names in Bihar, around 91 lakh names were deleted in West Bengal. Out of the 91 lakh removed in West Bengal, over 27 lakh people remained on the list of “logical discrepancies”, and could not vote in the Assembly polls on April 23 and 29. While the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) model reduced leakages in welfare delivery by cutting out middlemen and ghost beneficiaries, major gaps still remain in the system.
Adding that the moves raised serious questions, Chidambaram said, “Is citizenship the basis for inclusion in the electoral roll, or, is inclusion in the electoral roll the basis of citizenship? The Supreme Court should ponder the question”. After taking charge on May 10, the BJP government of Bengal made it clear that people deleted from the voter list during the SIR, including those whose appeals are pending before the tribunals.
“We will introduce the Annapurna Bhandar for women from June 1. Women will receive Rs 3,000 a month. But those still being verified by the tribunals will not be included in the list of beneficiaries for the time being,” West Bengal’s Minister for Women and Child Welfare and Social Welfare, Agnimitra Paul, was quoted as saying by the Kolkata-based newspaper. “We will do an analysis before June 1. Those whose names have been struck off, if they are receiving then they are not supposed to.