SIR in Bengal: More voters' names will be deleted after hearing on claims and objections, claims LoP Adhikari

Kolkata, Dec 16 (IANS) With 58.08 lakh voters in the previous voters' list in West Bengal as on October 2025 already being excluded in the draft voters' list on Tuesday, the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) and senior BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari has claimed that more voters' names will be deleted following the hearing session on claims and objections over the draft voters' list.

However, LoP Adhikari did not spell out any specific figure on this count, as did several months ago.

A state BJP committee member said that recently, the Central leadership of the party had cautioned the state leaders to refrain from quoting any figure that predicted any number of voters' names to be deleted, and hence, the LoP too cautiously avoided predicting any figure on this count.

"All I can say is that the figure of excluded voters will be much more in the final voters' list that will be published on February 14 next year," LoP Adhikari told media persons on Tuesday evening, hours after the draft voters' list in the state was published.

Political observers feel that LoP Adhikari's confidence on this count is coming from the fact that apart from 58.08 lakh excluded voters already identified, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has identified around 1.60 crore additional voters in whose cases the "progeny mapping" identified "weird" family-tree data.

These voters include those whose fathers were aged just 15 years or even lower at the time of becoming the fathers of the voters concerned, voters with fathers and mothers having the same names, and voters whose grandfathers were just 40-years-old or even lower while becoming the grandfathers, among others.

All such cases will be referred for hearing on claims and objections in the second stage of the voter revision exercise, and clarifications will be sought on the doubts about their voters' data. Only after that will the final voters' be published on February 14, 2026.

In the case of West Bengal, the ECI will, after the publication of the final voters' list, announce the dates for the Assembly elections scheduled next year.

--IANS

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